Clear Path Seen for US Telecom Providers Delivering Services to Cuba, Venable Says
"The path is now clear" for the U.S. to "help bring Cuban telecommunications into the [21st century]," said Jamie Barnett, a Venable cybersecurity and telecom lawyer, in an online memo, referring to a recent policy change of the Commerce Department's…
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Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS). The bureau's policy change regarding Cuba -- from a "case-by-case" review of telecommunications license applications to a "general policy of approval" -- became effective in late January, and coincides with recently announced amendments to the Cuban Asset Control Regulations (CACR) made by the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), Barnett said. OFAC's amendments to the CACR "further relax[ed] the restrictions on the economic activities in, and financing exports to, Cuba," he said. Barnett said OFAC took multiple, incremental steps in 2015 to open up U.S. telecom-based services in Cuba, and its most recent action in January continues that trend. "As both OFAC and BIS have made clear, the purpose of the new rules involving trade with Cuba is to engage the private sector in that country to the largest extent possible while supporting the Cuban government as little as practicable in keeping with this purpose," he said. "In the telecom field, the U.S. government appears to appreciate that major infrastructure projects will be required and that these can be accomplished only by working with the Cuban government." Although providers will need BIS licenses to "bring Cuba telecom into par with the U.S.," and U.S. companies will need to carefully negotiate the remaining OFAC sanctions, "U.S. policy is clearly to promote the modernization of Cuba's telecommunications sector."