Cuban Deported By U.S. Defies Order to Leave Canada / Washington Post
By Steven Pearlstein, Washington Post Foreign Service. Wednesday, March 1, 2000; Page A11
MONTREAL, Feb. 29—Canadian officials today ordered a Cuban diplomat who was expelled from the United States on spy charges to leave the country because his 48-hour transit visa had expired, but there was no indication that Cuba would comply.
Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy continued to demand that Cuban authorities "live up to their responsibilities and to the basic rules of diplomacy" by ordering Jose Imperatori home. Imperatori, 46, arrived Saturday after he was deported by the FBI because he wouldn't leave the United
States voluntarily. He applied for a 30-day visa on Monday, but Canada turned him down.
"It is surprising, frankly, that they would take this action," Axworthy said this afternoon. He termed Cuba's action a "serious breach" of diplomatic "practice, custom, convention and courtesy."
Imperatori is holed up in the Cuban Embassy--considered foreign soil under international law--so there is nothing Canadian officials can do to remove him other than threaten a further deterioration in relations with Havana.
A Cuban Embassy spokesman, Camilo Garcia, said he didn't know when Imperatori, who is in the fourth day of a hunger strike, was leaving. "He wants to go to the United States to clarify the situation on his case," Garcia said. He told Reuters news service that Imperatori's health is "deteriorating"
because of the hunger strike.
FBI agents brought Imperatori to Montreal on Saturday night on the understanding that he would fly to Havana on Sunday. Instead, he went to Ottawa where he has remained at the embassy on orders from his government, claiming he wants to disprove allegations that he was spying while working as the
vice consul in the Cuban interest section in Washington. His visa expired just before midnight on Monday, meaning that he is now in Canada illegally.
Privately, U.S. and Canadian diplomats view Imperatori's refusal to leave Canada as a publicity stunt designed to turn world opinion against the United States and rally anti-American sentiment in Havana, where Imperatori's wife has become a local hero.
The diplomat's wife and 3-year-old son returned to Havana Friday night after the State Department declared him persona non grata, alleging that he was the contact for a U.S. immigration official in Miami who has been accused of passing secrets to the Cuban government.
Earlier this year, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien announced that he was putting "a little northern ice" on Canada-Cuba relations after the government of Fidel Castro imposed unusually harsh sentences on four political dissidents. And Castro is reportedly still angry about the
defection of a half-dozen Cuban athletes during last summer's Pan American Games in Winnipeg.
© Copyright 2000 The Washington Post Company
Alleged Cuban Spy Still in Canada / AP
By Tom Cohen. .c The Associated Press
TORONTO, 29 (AP) - A Cuban diplomat expelled from the United States on suspicion of spying was violating Canadian law by holing up in the Cuban Embassy in Ottawa, Canada's foreign affairs minister said Tuesday.
Jose Imperatori has refused to eat solid food or leave the embassy since arriving in Canada on Saturday night, according to embassy spokesman Camilo Garcia. He said Imperatori wants to force his return to the United States to contest the espionage accusations, which he denies.
``That's his intention, to go back to the United States to clarify things,'' Garcia said.
Canadian and Cuban officials said little about the situation, apparently hoping they could quietly resolve the impasse away from media exposure.
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy said Imperatori's two-day transit visa granted Saturday had expired, making him an illegal alien.
``We've informed the Cuban authorities that he's now breaking the law of Canada,'' Axworthy said, acknowledging Canadian authorities were unable to arrest or deport Imperatori as long as he remained in the embassy, which is considered Cuban soil under international law.
Jordan Arias, a Cuban Embassy receptionist, said Tuesday that talks with Canadian officials on Imperatori's situation continued. He said Imperatori was healthy but was showing signs of weakness from the hunger strike, and was rejecting requests for interviews.
The case began last week when the U.S. government accused Imperatori, a diplomat in Washington, of helping a U.S. immigration official spy for Cuba.
Imperatori was declared persona non grata and ordered out of the country. Instead of leaving, he resigned his diplomatic post and challenged the U.S. government to prove the allegations.
In response, FBI agents escorted Imperatori to a government plane on Saturday night, and he was flown to Montreal as a transit stop on his way to Havana. But Imperatori, who announced his hunger strike before leaving Washington, went to the embassy in Ottawa instead.
His two-day transit visa, issued by Canada to try to resolve the U.S.-Cuba fracas over spying, expired Monday night, making Imperatori an illegal alien subject to arrest and deportation.
``He of course is still in their embassy, which is in effect their territory, so we don't have access to it under U.N. convention rules, but we expect the Cuban government to comply with their responsibilities and obligations under international law and ask him to return,'' Axworthy said.
Michael O'Shaughnessy, a foreign affairs spokesman, said Canada granted the transit visa to Imperatori on the understanding he would proceed to Havana. He said such visas are granted ``all the time'' to Cuban diplomats traveling to and from the United States, which has fewer flights to Cuba.
Lee Lorch, a York University mathematics professor who belongs to the Canadian-Cuban Friendship Society, questioned why Canada risked harming a stated foreign policy goal of warmer relations with Cuba by offering to help the United States kick out Imperatori.
He accused the U.S. government of trying to stir up public hostility against Cuba at a time of increased tension between the countries over the case of 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez.
U.S. officials deny any connection between the Gonzalez case and Imperatori's expulsion.
AP-NY-02-29-00 1912EST
Copyright 2000 The Associated Press
Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy has tough words, but no action, on illegal Cuban at embassy / Calgary Herald
Jennifer Ditchburn. Calgary Herald, March 1.
OTTAWA (CP) - Cuban authorities have openly defied Canadian law by harbouring a former diplomat in their embassy without proper immigration papers, Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy said Tuesday.
Jose Imperatori, declared persona non grata by the United States for allegedly participating in espionage there, arrived in Canada on Saturday with the understanding he would return to Cuba within two days.
By Tuesday, there were no indications the former envoy was going to leave the confines of the Cuban Embassy in Ottawa, despite the fact his 48-hour transit visa had expired.
"We've informed the Cuban authorities that he's now breaking the law of Canada," Axworthy said outside the House of Commons.
"He of course is still in their embassy, which is in effect their territory, so we don't have access to it under UN convention rules, but we expect the Cuban government to comply with their responsibilities and obligations under international law and ask him to return."
The flouting of visa restrictions means Imperatori would be subject to deportation, but Axworthy did not specify what would happen if Imperatori stepped off embassy grounds.
An RCMP officer in an unmarked car has been outside the building since early Tuesday.
"We're not going into the embassy because that's clearly part of Cuban territory, in effect, but if he's to leave the embassy he would then be subject to immigration procedures, and they would carry out what they would have to do under their own guidelines," Axworthy said.
Embassy officials would not comment on the situation, other than to say he was continuing the hunger strike he began during the weekend to protest his expulsion from the United States.
Imperatori has said he would like to return to the United States to clear his name of allegations of spying.
Axworthy said there were no immediate plans to take diplomatic measures, such as recalling the Canadian ambassador to Cuba.
"We still have an open relationship with Cuba, we have not broken ties, we're not engaging in any kind of economic sanctions or embargoes."
But the longer the situation drags on, the more difficult it will become to contain it within the context of a small political incident, says John Kavulich, president of the US-Cuba Trade and Economic Council.
"At the moment it is considered an issue of politics, but if there's seepage . . . then it may effect commercial relations, economic relations, and cultural relations and that's the danger," said Kavulich, who has dealt extensively with Canadian and Cuban diplomats.
"The question is determining how much time is allowed to go by before this diplomatic problem becomes a commercial problem."
Kavulich doesn't believe the issue will have an impact on Canada-U.S. relations, and Washington has not indicated it is concerned about his status.
James Rubin, a State Department spokesman, said "We presume that the Canadian government will resolve this matter directly with Mr. Imperatori and the Cuban government."
Rubin also said earlier in the week that Imperatori could potentially return to the United States to answer to the allegations.
Imperatori resigned as vice-consul of Cuba's Interests Section in Washington after being accused of providing information to Mariano Faget, a Cuban-born U.S. immigration officer who was arrested in Miami on allegation he was spying for Havana.
The Cuban government has accused Washington of slandering Imperatori to gain political points in the controversy surrounding six-year-old Elian Gonzalez. Gonzalez is at the middle of a custody battle between his father in Cuba and his Miami relatives.
© The Canadian Press, 2000
Copyright © 2000 Calgary Herald New Media
Envoy will never get chance to clear his name
Imperatori wants to answer spy charges, but U.S. won't let it happen, observers say
David Stonehouse. The Ottawa Citizen, with files from Citizen News Services
Cuban diplomat Jose Imperatori may believe in his innocence, but he'll likely never get the chance he is looking for: to return to the United States to clear his name of allegations he helped spy on the Americans.
"My hunch is that this is a genuine manifestation of a man who sees himself as having been wronged and set up by Washington," said Larry Birns, director of the Council of Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, D.C.
"But there is no way that he will be allowed to return to the United States. Now that we are in an election period, there is no way that the administration is going to back down on this. Maybe it should, but it is not."
Since the U.S. will not allow him back and the Canadian government would not be willing to jeopardize Canadian-American relations by allowing him to stay here, Mr. Imperatori will have little choice but to return to his homeland.
"That is the only logical solution in the situation," said Ashok Kapur, who teaches international politics at the University of Waterloo.
"My own feeling is that this is a no-win situation for him. It is an awkward thing for Canada because Canadian authorities can't march into the Cuban embassy and drag him out, because that is Cuban soil under international law," Mr. Kapur said last night.
"There is no legal basis for him to be holed up in the embassy and to make a statement from Canada."
Mr. Imperatori resigned as vice-consul of Cuba's Interests Section in Washington over the weekend after being accused of acting as a contact for a Cuban-born U.S. immigration officer arrested in Miami on allegations he was spying for Cuba.
When he would not return to Cuba by a U.S.-imposed deadline, U.S. authorities escorted him out of the country, flying him to Montreal. He went to Ottawa and refused to leave the Cuban embassy here.
He is now said to be on a hunger strike, protesting his innocence on the spying allegations and wanting to return to the U.S. to clear his name. But as far as the U.S. government is concerned, he'll be returning only to testify in the spy case against the immigration officer.
The U.S. government has signalled that it does not intend to get involved in the protest in Ottawa.
"We presume that the Canadian government will resolve this matter directly with Mr. Imperatori and the Cuban government," said James Rubin, a spokesman for the U.S. State Department.
Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy has also made it clear that the diplomat remains in Canada illegally and is expected to leave.
But Mr. Birns can't understand why the U.S. administration did not send the vice-consul directly to Cuba on a charter flight from Miami. And now that the Clinton administration has distanced itself, he speculates that the U.S. is punishing Mr. Axworthy for keeping open relations with Cuban
president Fidel Castro -- a stance at odds with the U.S. hard line against Cuba.
"I think there was a hot potato here and the hot potato has been tossed up to Canada," said Mr. Birns, whose group watches relations between Cuba and the U.S. as well as Canada. "The administration feels that Axworthy is soft, is relatively soft. What the administration will say
is if the Canada-Cuban connection didn't exist, neither would Castro."
Aside from any political manoeuvring, Canada is not likely willing to jeopardize relations with either Cuba or the U.S. by allowing what should have been a simple diplomatic withdrawal to be drawn out.
"It is not a serious issue in the sense that the U.S. government has the right to declare a person persona non grata -- that's etched in stone," Mr. Kapur said. "Whether the reasons are good or bad, you can dispute those, but that right cannot be taken away from the U.S.
government. And Cuba would have the same right."
While Mr. Imperatori's protestations of innocence have fired up anti-U.S. passions in Cuba where protesters have hailed him as a hero, the scholars say it would be misguided for Havana to blow up this diplomatic spat for political gain.
"Making this into a cause celebre in Cuba is pointless -- it is not worth it," Mr. Kapur said, arguing Mr. Castro would be better to press for allies over larger issues the U.S. trade embargo with his country.
At the same time, by not leaving the U.S. quietly, Mr. Imperatori could gather some international sympathy for Cuba -- particularly if the allegations of spying turn out to be weak or groundless.
But Mr. Birns believes the diplomat acted on his own in his protest, not at the behest of Havana -- at least early on. And now, he said, it will be up to the Cuban government to convince Mr. Imperatori to return home.
"This is so unprofessional -- all of this -- that he wouldn't just quietly leave. If this were Cuban policy it would strike me as so unproductive," Mr. Birns said. "I've come to the conclusion that, to his light, he is innocent."
Copyright 2000 Ottawa Citizen
Canada puts pressure on Cuba over lingering diplomat / National Post
Campbell Clark and Joel-Denis Bellavance. National Post. Wednesday, March 01, 2000
The federal government yesterday stepped up diplomatic pressure on Cuba to force Jose Imperatori, a Cuban diplomat expelled from the United States for spying, out of Canada.
Mr. Imperatori has remained in this country illegally and has refused to leave the Cuban embassy in Ottawa, where he is on a hunger strike, and return to Havana.
There was no sign late yesterday that Mr. Imperatori intended to leave, and Canadian officials acknowledged they can do nothing as long as he remains in the embassy, which, under international law, is an inviolate sanctuary that Canadian authorities cannot enter.
Lloyd Axworthy, the Foreign Affairs Minister, said Canada has told Cuban authorities in no uncertain terms that they are breaching international law and convention by failing to ensure Mr. Imperatori's return to Cuba within the agreed time frame.
"We've informed the Cuban authorities that he's now breaking the law of Canada," Mr. Axworthy said. "As a responsible government, they should do what is responsible, which is to bring him home."
However, the minister said he is not yet planning any dramatic retaliation, such as recalling Canada's ambassador to Havana.
The former vice-consul at the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C., was escorted out of the United States Saturday night on a flight to Montreal, where he was supposed to get a flight to Havana the next day. There are no direct flights from the U.S.
Immigration officials granted him a 48-hour transit visa to ease Mr. Imperatori's return -- but he instead travelled to the Cuban embassy in Ottawa.
His visa expired Monday night.
Cuban officials have said he is continuing the hunger strike he began in the U.S., and wants to return to America to fight allegations of spying. U.S. officials accuse the diplomat of acting as a contact for Mariano Faget, a Cuban-born U.S. immigration officer who has been arrested and charged
with spying for Cuba.
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Health worsens for Cuban diplomat
By Colin Nickerson, Globe Staff, 3/1/2000
MONTREAL - The health of the alleged spy who refuses to come in from Canada's cold was said to be ''deteriorating'' yesterday as the result of a hunger strike staged to protest his expulsion from the United States.
Flouting Canada's demand that he leave the country, Jose Imperatori - a diplomat assigned to Cuba's office in Washington until he was deported last week amid allegations of espionage - remained holed up in the Cuban Embassy in Ottawa in a peaceable but strange standoff.
''He is starving because of a situation created by the United States,'' said Camilio Garcia, second secretary at the Embassy. ''This is not a problem with Canada; it's a problem between Cuba and the US.''
But the situation has become an irritation and embarrassment for Canada, which allowed the United States to fly Imperatori to Montreal Saturday night with the understanding he would immediately board a commercial flight to Havana.
Instead, the 46-year-old envoy bolted for Ottawa, vowing to remain within the walls of Cuba's embassy in the Canadian capital until the United States apologizes and permits him to resume his duties in Washington. ''This is a struggle against slanders that hurt my honor,'' he declared through a
spokesman.
That leaves Canada unhappily stuck in the cross-fire of the latest row between Washington and Havana.
The Canadian government ordered Imperatori yesterday to leave the country immediately, but Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy conceded there is little that can be done to evict the alleged spy since the Embassy is Cuban territory under international law.
''It's a serious breach,'' Axworthy told reporters. ''I trust [Cuba] recognizes they have a responsibility in this matter. ... We pointed out to them this is not the way to conduct affairs.''
Meanwhile, what started as a fairly minor diplomatic fray has grabbed front-page attention across Canada, sparked protest demonstrations in Havana, and bemused Cuba watchers, who can't understand why Fidel Castro's regime is willing to risk harming relations with Canada, a crucial diplomatic
ally and the island's most important source of investment, tourists, and foreign aid.
''What's weird about this case is the guy's righteous indignation,'' said David Welch, a Cuban affairs specialist at the University of Toronto. ''He's personally offended. ... What an overreaction. Why not just go home?''
Imperatori got the boot from the United States after being accused of maintaining ''illicit contacts,'' in the State Department's phrase, with a senior official of the Immmigration and Naturalization Service who has been charged with passing secrets to the communist island state.
The spy ruckus comes as the United States and Cuba are at loggerheads over the fate of a 6-year-old Cuban boy, Elian Gonzalez, who was rescued from the sea last November by the US Coast Guard after his mother drowned trying to flee Cuba.
Elian is living with relatives in Florida, but the Castro government wants him returned to his father in Cuba.
This story ran on page A4 of the Boston Globe on 3/1/2000.
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