U.S. allows Cuba to play in World Baseball Classic

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government has reversed
course and will allow Cuba to play in a 16-nation baseball
tournament in the United States in March despite broad economic
sanctions against Havana, the U.S. Treasury Department said on
Friday.

Treasury last month denied a Major League Baseball request
for a license for Cuba to play in the World Baseball Classic,
but reversed its decision on the condition that President Fidel
Castro’s communist-run government receive no money.

The International Baseball Federation had said it would not
sanction the tournament if Cuba was left out, threatening the
collapse of the event.

Sports commentators had criticized the Treasury refusal,
saying a world baseball tournament without Cuba, the current
Olympic baseball champion, was like a Major League season
without the New York Yankees.

The United States maintains stiff sanctions against Cuba
that block most commercial transactions and prohibit Americans
from traveling freely to the island.

But it made an exception for baseball.

The World Cup-style baseball event is the first
international tournament to include Major League players and
will begin on March 3 in Tokyo and end in San Diego three weeks
later.

Major League Baseball reapplied for a license in December
after Cuba promised to donate any money it received to victims
of Hurricane Katrina.

“Working closely with World Baseball Classic Inc. and the
State Department, we were able to reach a licensable agreement
that upholds both the legal scope and spirit of the sanctions,”
Treasury spokeswoman Molly Millerwise said in an e-mailed
statement.

“This agreement ensures that no funding will find its way
into the hands of the Castro regime,” she added.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the Treasury
Department granted the baseball license after determining
various conditions were met, including concerns that any
revenues from the game might benefit the Cuban government.

Asked whether this indicated closer U.S. ties with Cuba, he
said: “I would not read anything into it any more than that
there will be some good baseball games in Puerto Rico,” where
Cuba is scheduled to play its first-round games.

‘POLITICAL HOME RUN’ FOR CUBA

In Havana, baseball-mad Cubans saw Washington’s reversal as
a “political home run” scored by their country.

“Now we are going to see who is who,” said Renier, a
baseball fan in Havana’s Central Park, where Cubans gather to
hotly debate baseball, their national passion.

“Washington changed its mind because the world of baseball
was really annoyed about Cuba not being there,” he said.

There was no immediate official comment from Havana on an
event that promises to be a clash between Cuban amateur sport
and American professionalism, which has lured away many Cuban
stars with multimillion-dollar contracts.

Castro suggested on Tuesday the United States was scared to
take on Cuban baseball players, among the best in the world.

Many have defected to the United States, including such
big-league stars as pitchers Jose Contreras and Orlando “El
Duque” Hernandez of the World Series champion Chicago White Sox
and Hernandez’s brother Livan Hernandez, who pitches for the
Washington Nationals.

Anti-Castro exiles in Miami were disappointed the Bush
administration had allowed Cuba to play in the United States.

Cuban-American congressman Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Florida
Republican, said Castro would use the tournament for propaganda
purposes and called on Cuban players to defect.

“I hope that the Cuban players will use this opportunity to
escape totalitarianism and reach freedom in the U.S.,” he said
in statement.

(Additional reporting by Anthony Boadle in Havana)