By Ray Sanchez, Elise Labott and Patrick Oppmann, CNN

(CNN) — Alan Gross, a U.S. government subcontractor imprisoned in Cuba for smuggling satellite equipment onto the island, is being held at Havana’s Carlos J. Finlay Military Hospital.

With peeling canary-yellow walls and hordes of people coming and going, the aging building doesn’t look like a place where Cuba would hold its most valuable prisoner.

But police officers and soldiers surround the hospital. Inside, Cuban special forces guard the 65-year-old U.S. citizen, emotionally and physically frail and approaching his fifth year in confinement.

North of the Florida Straits, Gross’ imprisonment is seen as the major impediment to better relations with Havana.

Now, however, midway through the second term of President Barack Obama, several signs of possible change have emerged. Senior administration officials and Cuba observers say reforms on the island and changing attitudes in the United States have created an opening for improved relations.

The signs include the admission this week by senior administration officials that talks about a swap between Gross and three imprisoned Cuban agents — part of group originally known as the Cuban Five — have taken place. In addition, recent editorials in The New York Times have recommended an end to the longstanding U.S. embargo against Cuba and even a prisoner swap for Gross.

Who is Alan Gross?

U.S. officials said Gross, who is Jewish, was trying to help Cuba’s small Jewish community bypass stringent restrictions on Internet access.

Cuban authorities, however, countered that he was part of a plot to create a “Cuban Spring” and destabilize the island’s single-party Communist system in a clandestine effort to expand Internet access. Gross had traveled to Cuba multiple times as a tourist.

Gross had worked for Development Alternatives Inc., a Maryland-based subcontractor that received a multimillion-dollar U.S. contract for so-called democracy building on the island.

Fulton Armstrong was a senior adviser to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee under then-Sen. John Kerry when Gross was arrested. The subcontractor’s mission, under what Armstrong characterized as USAID “regime-change” programs, was “dangerous and counterproductive,” he said.

Alan Gross ‘withdrawn,’ saying goodbye

A 2012 lawsuit filed by Gross’ wife, Judy, accused USAID and Development Alternatives Inc. of negligence. It said the agencies had a contract “to establish operations supporting the creation of a USAID Mission” in Cuba.

The operation involved the smuggling of parabolic satellite dishes hidden in Styrofoam boogie boards, Armstrong said. Cash was transported to Cuba to finance demonstrations against the Castro regime.

“They were sending this poor guy into one of the most sophisticated counterintelligence operating environments in the world,” said Armstrong, who spent 25 years as a CIA officer. “It was not credible his story about the Jews. It didn’t make sense.”

In March 2011, Gross was tried behind closed doors for two days and convicted of attempting to set up an Internet network for Cuban dissidents “to promote destabilizing activities and subvert constitutional order.”

Wife of Alan Gross says he feels ‘hopeless’

Gross’ lawyer, Scott Gilbert, said years of confinement have taken a toll. His client has lost more than 100 pounds. He is losing his teeth. Gross’ hips are so weak that he can barely walk.

Gross, who has lost vision in one eye, has threatened to take his life, Gilbert said. Frustrated with the lack of progress in his case, the American has refused to see U.S. diplomats who once visited him at least monthly.

“Emotionally, Alan is done,” Gilbert said. “He said goodbye to his family in July. … He has prepared himself, as he has said, to come back to the United States, dead or alive. Time is very short.”

Who are the Cuban Five?

The name may conjure images of the tropical equivalent of the Jackson 5, but the Cuban Five are agents convicted in 2001 for intelligence gathering in Miami. They were part of what was called the Wasp Network, which collected intelligence on prominent Cuban-American exile leaders and U.S. military bases.

The five — Ruben Campa, also known as Fernando Gonzalez; Rene Gonzalez; Gerardo Hernandez; Luis Medina, also known as Ramon Labanino; and Antonio Guerrero — were arrested in September 1998.

Hernandez, the group leader, also was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder for engineering the downing of two planes flown by the exile group Brothers to the Rescue in 1996. He’s serving two life sentences.

Cuban fighter jets shot down the unarmed Cessnas as they flew toward the island, where they had previously dropped anti-government leaflets. Four men died.

At trial, the defendants said their mission was to gather intelligence in Miami to defend Cuba from anti-Castro groups they feared would attack the island. Seven members of the network cooperated with U.S. authorities and are believed to be in witness protection.

In February, Fernando Gonzalez was released from a U.S. federal prison after serving 15 years for failing to register as a foreign agent and possessing forged documents.

In 2011, Rene Gonzalez was released after serving most of his 15-year sentence.

In Cuba, the two spies were welcomed as heroes. They were considered “political prisoners” unjustly punished in American courts. Their faces appeared on billboards throughout the island. State-controlled media labeled them “terrorism fighters.”

A federal appeals court originally threw out their convictions but later reinstated them.

Defense lawyers accused lower courts of unfairly refusing to move the trial to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, from politically charged Miami, where anti-Castro hostility was more prevalent. They also raised serious questions about the jury selection process.

The trial for the Cuban Five was the only judicial proceeding in U.S. history condemned by the U.N. Human Rights Commission. Amnesty International also raised serious doubts about the fairness and impartiality of their trial.

Why do some people believe the time is right for a swap?

With the U.S. midterm elections over, some Cuba observers believe the time is ripe for a breakthrough in relations. As a second-term president, Obama doesn’t have to worry about re-election.

“The political stars are well aligned because both Obama and (Cuban leader) Raul Castro have repeatedly said that they’d like to see an improvement in relations,” said William LeoGrande, an American University professor and co-author of a new book, “Back Channel to Cuba,” which chronicles decades of negotiations between the two countries.

In April 2015, at the Summit of the Americas in Panama, the two leaders may have an opportunity to meet face to face.

Before then, the White House can lay the groundwork for agreements aimed at “burying the historical hatchet between the U.S. and Cuba,” said Peter Kornbluh, co-author of “Back Channel to Cuba” and senior analyst at the National Security Archive.

“Richard Nixon went all the way to China, and Barack Obama only has to go to Panama,” he said.

In Washington, senior administration officials predict more cooperation, with an important caveat.

“There is stuff we can do, but it has to start with Gross,” one of the officials said.

Administration officials say talks about a possible swap have taken place, but they’re hesitant to speak about whether those discussions are progressing. The White House came under fire after the recent swap of five Taliban detainees for the release of U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.

Bergdahl was freed last spring after nearly five years in captivity at the hands of militants in Afghanistan. His controversial release came in exchange for five mid- to high-level Taliban detainees from Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.

“They’ve been in jail for 16 years,” LeoGrande said of the Cuban agents, “and on humanitarian grounds alone it’s reasonable to release them when we stand to gain the release of an American citizen.

“It’s a better deal than trading five Taliban commanders for one U.S. soldier.”

No one knows how the incoming Republican-controlled Senate will handle Cuba policy. Most Republicans don’t feel strongly about the Cuba issue, and some lawmakers in agricultural states have supported a lifting of the trade and financial embargo in force for more than 50 years.

With Sen. Robert Menendez, D-New Jersey, soon to be replaced as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, one of the most powerful opponents to greater engagement with Cuba will have a decreased platform from which to criticize the administration on Cuba issues. But Menendez will remain on the committee, as will Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, another strong Cuba critic.

Why do others say the swap won’t happen?

On Tuesday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters that while the President has said Cuba policy is worth reconsidering, the administration has “significant concerns … about (the Cuban government’s) human rights record, their failure to observe basic human rights, as it relates to not just the illegitimate detention of Mr. Gross, but as it relates to the basic rights to free speech and political expression of the people of Cuba.”

Some longtime Cuba observers are skeptical of the prisoner-swap idea.

“It’s conceivable that it could happen now,” said Armstrong, the former senior adviser to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “Who knows? (Attorney General) Eric Holder is leaving the and Obama is now pretty much a lame duck, and Bob Menendez will no longer be chairman of foreign relations, and Alan Gross should be home by Thanksgiving or Christmas or Hanukkah. Enough is enough. But we’ve been at this point before.”

In “Back Channel to Cuba,” LeoGrande and Kornbluh describe backdoor negotiations in 1963 that led to the release of more than two dozen Americans jailed in Cuba, including members of a CIA team caught planting listening devices in Havana.

The U.S. gave up four Cuban prisoners, including an attaché at the U.N. mission and two indicted for planning acts of sabotage. The fourth was a Cuban convicted of murder for killing a 9-year-old girl who was struck by a stray bullet during a fight with anti-Castro Cubans when Fidel Castro visited New York in 1960.

Castro granted clemency to the American prisoners. And the United States released the Cubans in what the Justice Department described as an act of clemency “in the national interest.”

In 1979, President Jimmy Carter granted clemency and released three Puerto Rican nationalists, including Lolita Lebron, who had been convicted for opening fire in the U.S. House of Representatives and wounding five congressmen. The deal was part of a backdoor “humanitarian exchange” in which Fidel Castro released four CIA agents 11 days later.

Said Kornbluh, “It is time to bring U.S.-Cuba relations into the 21st century.”

CNN’s Ray Sanchez reported and wrote in New York, Elise Labott reported from Washington and Patrick Oppmann reported from Havan

http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/world/2014/11/07/pkg-oppmann-cuba-gross-last-days.cnn.html

Ricardo Alarcón on NYT & the Cuban 5.
3 languages/idiomas/langues

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(ESPAÑOL SIGUE ABAJO)
(FRANÇAIS SUIT CI-DESSOUS)

ENGLISH

The New York Times Breaks the Media Blockade

Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada

November 6, 2014

In my article currently circulating in Nueva Réplica I regretted that the New York Times had not raised the case of Gerardo, Ramón and Antonio in its editorial last October in which the paper called for ending the US blockade against Cuba.

When I wrote it, I did not imagine that with that document, the New York paper would start an important debate, which has lasted a month and includes several editorials advocating a substantial change in the relations between the two countries. The latest one, published Sunday, November 2, proposed that the three be released and that in exchange, Cuba for humanitarian reasons would free Alan Gross who was sentenced here for participating in illegal activities to overthrow the revolutionary government.

This is a fair and reasonable position. The paper is right when it defines the release of three Cuban heroes as a vital step towards civilized coexistence between two countries that are and will always be neighbors.

It should be added to the arguments of the Times that none of the Five were accused of espionage and therefore were not “spies”. As was demonstrated at the trial in Miami, none of them had access to secret information related to the national security of the United States. Neither had been given directions to look for that kind of information. This was acknowledged under oath by Gen. James R. Clapper who was a government witness whose testimony appears on pages 13089-13235 of the trial transcript. It’s the same Clapper who today is the Director of National Intelligence in the Obama Administration.

It is also necessary to remember that the mission of the Five was to try to thwart terrorist plans against Cuba which more than once have caused death and damage also to people living in United States.

But, in any case, this editorial from the New York Times should be hailed as an event of transcendental importance. The wall of silence surrounding the case of the Five has received a devastating blow which hopefully is final.

A CubaNews translation by Walter Lippmann.

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/CubaNews/info

ESPAÑOL

The New York Times rompe el bloqueo mediático

Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada

6 noviembre 2014

En mí artículo que aparece en la Nueva Réplica actualmente circulando reproché al New York Times que no hubiese planteado el caso de Gerardo, Ramón y Antonio en su Editorial del pasado octubre en el que se pronunció por la eliminación del bloqueo norteamericano contra Cuba.

Cuando lo escribí no imaginaba que con ese documento el diario neoyorquino iniciaba un importante debate, que dura ya un mes, e incluye varios editoriales abogando por un cambio sustancial en las relaciones entre ambos países. El más reciente del domingo 2 de noviembre, propone que los tres sean liberados a cambio de que Cuba por razones humanitarias ponga en libertad a Allan Gross sancionado aquí por participar en actividades ilegales destinadas a derrocar al Gobierno revolucionario.

Se trata de una posición justa y razonable. Tiene razón el periódico cuando define la liberación de los tres Héroes cubanos como un paso indispensable para avanzar hacia la convivencia civilizada entre dos países que son y serán siempre vecinos.

Debería agregarse a los argumentos del Times que ninguno de los Cinco fue acusado de realizar espionaje y por tanto no eran “espías”. Como se demostró en el juicio de Miami ninguno de ellos accedió o buscó informaciones secretas relacionadas con la seguridad nacional de Estados Unidos. Tampoco recibieron orientaciones para buscar ese tipo de informaciones. Así lo reconoció, bajo juramento, el General James R. Clapper quien fue testigo del Gobierno y cuyo testimonio aparece entre las páginas 13089 a 13235 de las Actas Oficiales del Tribunal. Es el mismo Clapper que hoy es el Director Nacional de Inteligencia de la Administración Obama.

También es necesario recordar que la misión de los Cinco era tratar de frustrar los planes terroristas contra Cuba que más de una vez han causado muerte y daños también a personas residentes en Estados Unidos.

Pero, en todo caso, este Editorial del New York Times debe ser saludado como un hecho de importancia trascendental. El muro de silencio que rodeaba el caso de los Cinco ha recibido un golpe demoledor que ojalá sea definitivo.

http://www.cubadebate.cu/

FRANÇAIS

Le New York Times brise le blocus médiatique

Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada

Dans mon article qui paraît actuellement dans la Nueva Réplica, je déplorais que le New York Times n’ait pas évoqué le cas de Gerardo, Ramón et Antonio dans son éditorial d’octobre dernier dans lequel le journal appelait à rompre le blocus des États-Unis contre Cuba.

Quand je l’ai rédigé, je ne soupçonnais pas qu’à partir de cet article, le journal new-yorkais lancerait un important débat, lequel a duré un mois et inclus plusieurs éditoriaux préconisant un changement majeur dans les relations entre les deux pays. Le dernier, publié le dimanche 2 novembre, suggérait que les trois hommes soient libérés et qu’en échange, Cuba, pour des raisons humanitaires, libère Alan Gross condamné ici pour avoir participé à des activités illégales visant à renverser le gouvernement révolutionnaire.

C’est un point de vue honnête et équitable. Le journal a raison de considérer la libération des trois héros cubains comme une étape essentielle vers une coexistence harmonieuse entre les deux pays qui sont et seront toujours voisins.

Il faut ajouter aux arguments du NYT qu’aucun des Cinq n’a été accusé d’espionnage et qu’ils ne sont pas, de ce fait, des « espions ». Comme il l’a été prouvé au procès à Miami, aucun d’entre eux n’a eu accès à des informations secrètes liées à la sécurité nationale des États-Unis ni non plus reçu de mandat pour chercher ce type d’information. Ceci a été reconnu sous serment par le général James R. Clapper, témoin officiel du gouvernement étasunien, dont le témoignage apparaît aux pages 13089-13235 du compte rendu du procès. Clapper est aujourd’hui directeur des Services de renseignements nationaux (National Intelligence) de l’administration Obama.

Il convient également de rappeler que la mission des Cinq était de déjouer des plans terroristes contre Cuba, lesquels ont plus d’une fois entraîné des décès et des destructions, y compris aux États-Unis.

En tout état de cause, cet éditorial du New York Times devrait être salué comme un évènement d’importance capitale. Le mur de silence qui a entouré le cas des Cinq a reçu une onde de choc dévastatrice qui, espérons-le, aura été décisive.

Traduit par Anne-Marie Deraspe, assisté par Arnold August, Montréal

www.democracycuba.com

Readers: Please use this as a model for sending your own letters to President Obama!

From the: International Committee for the   Freedom of the Cuban 5

Lawrence Wilkerson is Distinguished Visiting Professor of Government and Public Policy at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

His last position in government was chief of staff to Colin Powell at the U.S. Department of State (2002-2005).  He served 31 years in the US Army (1966-1998).

Here is his letter to President Obama:

November 5, 2014

The White House

Dear Mr. President,

It is time to correct an injustice that is in your power to amend. This injustice mars majorly the American system of justice, the U.S. record on human rights and, as importantly, the lives of five men whose dedication to the security of their own country against terrorist attack should be admired and respected, not punished. No doubt you have heard of these men: Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, Ramón Labaniño Salazar, Antonio Guerrero Rodríguez, Fernando González Llort, and Rene González Sehwerert. The world knows them as The Cuban Five.

Two of these men are today out of prison, two more might be out in the far future, and one might never see the dawn of a free day.  This latter individual, Gerardo Hernández, I tried to visit-unsuccessfully-in the maximum security prison in Victorville, California.  Though I was unable to visit him, a true and trusted colleague who accompanied me, the late Saul Landau, was able to do so and reported to me that Gerardo remains as courageous and undaunted as ever yet still puzzled over the failure to act of what is supposed to be the world’s greatest democracy.

The Cuban Five suffered a gross injustice when they were arrested in 1998. After their arrests they spent 17 months in solitary confinement. Their trial took place in Miami, Florida and in 2001 they were sentenced to long prison terms. At a legal minimum, the trial through which they suffered in Miami should have been moved to another location, as change-of-venue arguments alone were not only persuasive they were overwhelming, testified to amply when the appeals court in Atlanta, voting in a three-judge panel, supported a change of venue. Later, however, this decision was reversed when the political power of George W. Bush’s administration-an administration in which I served-compelled the court, voting in its entirety to reconsider the three-judge panel’s decision and vote differently; they ratified the sentences of two of them, and the case of the other three were sent back to the court in Miami for re-sentencing. The court recognized that the guide of sentencing were wrongly applied and as a result reduced their prison terms.

But there is more, much more. In fact, there is the now-indisputable fact that the five were not guilty of the substantive charges brought against them in the first place. The politics surrounding the trial were in the hands of hard-line Cuban-Americans in Florida, as well as in the US Congress. Without their blatant interference with the course of justice, the trial never would have taken place. Moreover, these people spent taxpayer dollars to enlist journalists in Miami to write condemnatory articles, to influence the jury pool for the trial, and to predispose public opinion to a guilty verdict. This trial was a political payoff to hard-line Cuban-Americans and every person in the United States and across the world who pays attention to these matters, knows it. Indeed, you know it, Mr. President. This kangaroo-court trial is a blemish on the very fabric of America’s democracy. It sends a clear signal to all the world-who judge us not as we judge ourselves, by how we feel about issues, but by our deeds.

You, Mr. President, cannot erase this blemish; it has lingered too long and too many years have been stolen from these men’s lives by it.  But you can mitigate it, you can make it less formidable. And, vitally, you can clean the reputation of our justice system, and, in the case of Gerardo and the other two men still in prison, you can free them.

The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions, in May of 2005, declared the imprisonment of the Cuban Five to be a violation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, placing the United States alongside some of the most heinous countries on earth. The Working Group requested that the U.S. take action to remedy the situation. You, Mr. President, can do just that.

Mr. President, you said that “we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards.” But in certain instances, that is wrong and you know it. Would you have us not look back to our Civil War? To the depredations of Black slavery that led to it? To the century-long economic slavery that followed that war? To the racism of our past-a racism that still plagues us today? I think not. And you should not deny the need to look back, review and reverse this mockery of a trial.

Take action, Mr. President. Release immediately the three remaining imprisoned members of the Cuban Five. Admit publicly the gross injustice done to all of them and elaborate the reasons. Apologize to the Cuban people and to our citizens and, most of all, to the Cuban Five and their families. Listen to “the better angels of our nature” and put the United States back on the side of justice.

Very Respectfully,

     Lawrence B. Wilkerson

Colonel, US Army (Retired)