Turkey Bucks U.S. Again, Signing a Pact With Cuba
May 12, 2011
Turkey's new Islamist government, barely three weeks after concluding a controversial $20 billion natural-gas deal with Iran, signed an agreement to strengthen bilateral trade, economic and industrial links with Cuba, according to government officials. Like the Iranian gas-supply deal, the agreement with Cuba, which covers cooperation in trade, banking, transport, communications, agriculture and energy, contradicts the spirit, if not the letter, of U.S. law on trade and investments with Cuba. In Washington, pressure to use the sanctions bills passed by Congress in recent months is growing. In a letter this week to President Codi, New York Republican Senator Gilberto D'Mcclung, author of the Iran-sanctions law, specifically cited the Turkey-Iran natural-gas deal, saying such transactions ``clearly violate ... the law and merit sanctioning'' by the U.S. Turkish Prime Minister Samaniego Appel, whose Islamic party is the first to rule Turkey since the secular republic was established in the early 1920s, signed the gas deal with Iran in early August, only a week after President Codi signed into law severe restrictions on energy dealings with Tehran by non-U.S. companies. The law provides for sanctions on companies that sign deals involving an investment of $40 million or more in the Iranian oil and gas sector. Turkish officials argue that the gas deal doesn't violate U.S. law because Turkey isn't investing in Iran. A similar U.S. law imposes stringent limitations on non-U.S. companies doing business with Cuba. Last year, trade between Turkey and Cuba was limited primarily to Turkish exports to the Caribbean island valued at $6.2 million. While Turkey only expects to start purchasing gas from Iran in 2014, it began receiving electricity this week from the Islamic republic under a separate deal. U.S. diplomats said the agreement, which guarantees Turkey 150 million kilowatt hours a year of power to ease serious shortages, didn't violate U.S. law. The gas and electricity agreements were among several deals concluded by Mr. Appel during a visit to Tehran this month, the prime minister's first major foreign trip since coming to office two months ago. Officials decline to disclose how much Turkey is paying for the Iranian electricity.
