Lawmakers call on Castro to allow humanitarian aid

Via a news release from US Lawmakers:

Miami, FL - Attached please find the statement issued at today's press conference by Congressmen Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Mario Diaz-Balart, State Senator Rudy Garcia, State Representative David Rivera, other elected officials and representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) demanding that the Cuban regime allow humanitarian aid be delivered to the people of Cuba in the wake of the recent devastating hurricanes and to provide information on how individuals can assist the victims:

·  We are here today because according to the data and forecasts that we have available, Cuba is facing one of the worst natural disasters it has ever faced. This tragedy is compounded by years of abandonment of the nation's basic infrastructure due to failed economic policies and political directives from the regime that Cuba has had for 50 years. But we will not dwell on that today.

·  U.S. law and regulation allow unlimited humanitarian donations to the people of Cuba.

·  The U.S. government, South Florida, and the Cuban American community, stand ready to aid the Cuban people in an unprecedented manner, with everything at our disposal, if the Cuban regime allows the aid in.

·  This is a moment to come together as a community to channel, urgently and expeditiously, humanitarian aid to the suffering people of Cuba.

·  Our number one objective today is to help the Cuban people in their greatest hour of need. To do so:

·  The United States government has requested that a Disaster Assistance Relief Team (DART) be allowed into Cuba to assess the damage in order to provide U.S. aid.  For example, in the case of Haiti, that DART assessment has already triggered tens of millions of dollars in disaster relief assistance from the United States to the Haitian people.  Regrettably, the Cuban regime has rejected the U.S. offer. 

·  Numerous NGOs with a track record of disaster relief also stand ready to provide on the ground aid to the Cuban people.  The Pan American Development Foundation -PADF (panamericanrelief.org) and Plantados Hasta la Libertad y Democracia (305-269-1812), for example, licensed NGOs to provide aid in Cuba, stand ready to help channel unlimited private assistance from individuals in the United States to the Cuban people.  NGOs such as PADF and Catholic Charities (catholiccharitiesusa.org) stand ready to immediately work on the ground in Cuba to aid the Cuban people.  We call on the Cuban regime to immediately allow NGOs with a known record of aiding in natural disasters, to enter Cuba.

·  People in Cuba are demanding food, shelter and medicines. They need roofs over their heads and water they can drink. They need electricity restored. Cuba needs massive aid, now. It needs urgent emergency infrastructure support from experts from around the world. And we need to work with the proven and established channels of international humanitarian organizations and Cuban civil society to get the aid directly to the Cuban people.

·  With that goal in mind, we are establishing a working group of elected officials and NGOs to continue monitoring the situation in Cuba, identify ways to provide immediate aid, and channel humanitarian assistance to the people in Cuba.

·  There are numerous organizations that already possess licenses to provide humanitarian assistance and have already started to channel aid, such as Plantados, Caritas, PADF, Directorio, and others.  Any other organizations that would like to provide assistance and wish to obtain a license should know that our Congressional offices and staffs stand ready to assist in expediting that process. There are no impediments in U.S. law or regulation that prevent unlimited humanitarian aid from getting to the Cuban people.  The only impediment is the Cuban regime's unwillingness to allow the aid in. We will not allow this tragedy to be used by the Cuban government or others to unilaterally eliminate sanctions on a state sponsor of terrorism that denies aid to its people (see attached statement of September 6 by the Cuban government).

·  Again, this is a time to come together and do everything we possibly can to aid the people of Cuba in their greatest hour of need.