Contractor case stalls U.S.-Cuba rapprochement

Contractor case stalls U.S.-Cuba rapprochement
Fri Aug 5, 2011 1:33pm EDT

(Reuters) - Cuba's Supreme Court on Friday upheld the conviction and
15-year prison sentence of American aid contractor Alan Gross for crimes
against the Cuban state.

It was the latest step in a politically sensitive case which has stalled
efforts to improve U.S.-Cuban relations.

Here are some facts about Gross' arrest and imprisonment:

* Gross, 62, a longtime development worker who had carried out
assignments around the world, was detained by Cuban authorities at a
Havana hotel on December 3, 2009.

* The United States has said he was in Cuba installing Internet
equipment for Jewish groups, but Cuban prosecutors said he was in a
"subversive project" to "destroy the revolution" through use of
information technology.

* Cuba has described Gross as a "mercenary" in the ideological war
between Washington and Havana that began soon after the 1959 Cuban
Revolution at the height of the Cold War.

* Gross entered Cuba at least five times on a tourist visa even though
he was working as a contractor for Maryland-based company DAI under a
U.S. Agency for International Development program that Cuba considers
part of long-standing U.S. plans to subvert the island's communist-led
government.

* Cuba said in the trial Gross denounced DAI, telling the panel of
judges it had "used and manipulated" him.

* Cuban prosecutors sought a 20-year sentence for Gross. The judges
handed down a 15-year prison term.

* U.S.-Cuba relations had warmed slightly under President Barack Obama
but U.S. officials say there will be no major initiatives as long as
Gross is held.

* The White House called the 15-year prison sentence against Gross an
"injustice." A U.S. spokeswoman in Havana said it was "appalling that
the Cuban government seeks to criminalize what most of the world deems
normal, in this case access to information and technology."

* Gross has been held in a Havana military hospital. Wife Judy Gross has
visited him and said he has lost a lot of weight and has several
physical ailments.

* She wrote a letter to Cuban President Raul Castro last year,
expressing remorse for her husband's work and asking for his release
because their daughter had been diagnosed with breast cancer. The
daughter has since had a double mastectomy and his mother has inoperable
cancer.

* Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter visited Gross in March and since
then other prominent American visitors to Cuba have also been allowed to
see him. U.S. diplomats in Havana have regular access to the contractor.

* There were reports last year that Washington may swap five Cuban
agents jailed as spies in the United States for Gross, but a State
Department spokesman said in September that was not true.

(Reporting by Jeff Franks, Marc Frank, Rosa Tania Valdes and Nelson
Acosta in Havana; editing by Pascal Fletcher and Mohammad Zargham)

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/05/us-cuba-contractor-factbox-idUSTRE7744OH20110805