The United States is yanking more than half its diplomatic personnel from the embassy in Havana and warning Americans not to visit Cuba, saying it's for their own safety after at least 21 Americans connected to the embassy suffered mysterious injuries.
Senior State Department officials said embassy employees had been "targeted" for "specific attacks," a significant change from previous characterizations of what happened as simply "incidents."
The U.S. Embassy in Cuba will lose roughly 60 percent of its American staff and will stop processing visas for prospective Cuban travelers to the United States indefinitely, officials said. Roughly 50 Americans had been working at the embassy.
President Donald Trump said that in Cuba "they did some very bad things" that harmed U.S. diplomats, but he didn't say who he might mean by "they." The White House did not immediately respond to a request seeking clarity on the president's remarks.
Some who favor stronger U.S.-Cuba ties said poisoned relations were the ultimate goal of the envoy drawdown.
Ben Rhodes, former President Barack Obama's deputy national security adviser who negotiated renewed ties with Cuba, tweeted, "Goal of whoever is behind attacks seems to be sabotaging US-Cuba relations. Would be a shame if they succeed. Cuban people wld suffer most."
Some of the diplomats were injured in at least one hotel -- the Capri -- in the Cuban capital. Employees temporarily deployed to the mission were staying there, as it is close to the embassy. The officials said they know of no other guests or hotel employees who were affected, but concern that others might be hurt prompted them to issue a broader warning advising against travel to Cuba.
"We have no reports that private U.S. citizens have been affected, but the attacks are known to have occurred in U.S. diplomatic residences and hotels frequented by U.S. citizens," Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in a statement. "The Department does not have definitive answers on the cause or source of the attacks and is unable to recommend a means to mitigate exposure."
Cuba has denied having anything to do with the injuries, and the U.S. has not blamed Cuba for them.
Josefina Vidal, the top Cuban official managing relations with the United States, issued a statement reiterating assurances that Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez gave Tillerson on Tuesday when he flew to Washington to explain measures Cuba has taken to protect U.S. diplomats and their families -- steps Tillerson evidently found wanting.
"We consider that the decision announced by the Department of State is hasty and that it will affect the bilateral relations, specifically, the cooperation in matters of mutual interest and the exchanges on different fields between both countries," Vidal said.
A State Department official acknowledged in a news briefing that Cuba has facilitated the U.S. investigation as well as conducted its own probe, but said the U.S. cannot allow a full diplomatic presence to be maintained and must discourage American citizens from traveling to Cuba "until we understand more about the source, and means, and ways to mitigate the attacks."
SKELETON STAFF
The withdrawal order applies to all nonessential staff and their families; only "emergency personnel" will stay. The skeleton staff is being kept to assist U.S. citizens in Cuba who have pressing issues, but more routine diplomatic and consular functions will likely be slowed.
The diplomatic drawdown means that no visas will be processed at the embassy because there will not be enough people to do the work.
In addition, only U.S. government officials involved with the ongoing investigation or who need to travel there for national security or critical embassy operations will be allowed to travel to Cuba, the officials said. No U.S. delegations will visit Cuba for bilateral meetings, although they may meet in the United States.
The administration had considered expelling Cuban diplomats from the U.S., officials said, but for now no such action has been ordered. That incensed several lawmakers who had urged the administration to kick out all of Cuban's envoys.
"It's an insult," Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a vocal critic of Cuba's government, said in an interview. "The Cuban regime succeeded in forcing Americans to downscale a number of personnel in Cuba, yet it appears they're going to basically keep all the people they want in America to travel freely and spread misinformation."
The State Department has acknowledged that at least 21 Americans connected to the embassy have been hurt in the attacks, the most recent of which occurred in August. No Cuban employees of the embassy have complained of any symptoms, only American diplomats.
Among the health symptoms are hearing loss, dizziness, tinnitus, balance problems, visual difficulties, headaches, fatigue, cognitive issues and sleeping difficulties.
Some U.S. diplomats reported hearing loud noises or feeling vibrations when the incidents occurred, but others heard and felt nothing yet reported symptoms later. In some cases, the effects were narrowly confined, with victims able to walk "in" and "out" of blaring noises audible in only certain rooms or parts of rooms, The Associated Press has reported.
Though the incidents stopped for a time, they recurred as recently as late August.
Nearly 10 months after the first complaints surfaced, neither U.S. nor Cuban investigators are any closer to identifying what is causing the injuries, or who is responsible. Investigators are looking into the possibility that they were subjected to some sort of "sonic attack," among other theories, though it is not clear why American diplomats and a handful of Canadian envoys would be the only ones to complain of symptoms.
Another possibility being explored is that agents acting on behalf of a third country may be responsible.
Canada, which also has reported diplomats with unexplained health problems, said it had no plans to change its diplomatic posture in Cuba.
COTTON WEIGHS IN
The move marks the most serious crisis between the two countries since U.S.-Cuba relations were normalized in 2015 under Obama and comes at a time when the Trump administration is seeking to limit tourism and trade to the island until the government makes more democratic overhauls.
"Whoever is doing this obviously is trying to disrupt the normalization process between the United States and Cuba," Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said in a statement Friday. "Someone or some government is trying to reverse that process."
James Williams, the head of Engage Cuba, a coalition of business groups, urged redoubled efforts to solve the mystery. "We must be careful that our response does not play into the hands of the perpetrators of these attacks," he added.
The American Foreign Service Association, the union that represents diplomats, earlier this week came out against withdrawing diplomats. Barbara Stephenson, president of the group, said diplomats commonly brave risks such as illness, war and oppressive smog.
"We decide we're going to take risks because our presence matters," she said Friday. "This is the nature of the work that we do."
But Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., called the government under Raul Castro "untrustworthy and malicious."
"It was foolish of President Obama to open his arms to such a brutal, Marxist regime. Now, our diplomats and their families have paid the price, and we should declare every Cuban diplomat persona non grata until those responsible for these attacks are brought to justice," Cotton said in a statement.
The U.S. travel warning has the potential to bite into Cuba's burgeoning tourism industry. The Cuban government says more than 4 million people visited last year, a 13 percent increase it attributed to American and European visitors. Overall, the government said they pumped almost $2 billion into the economy.
About 615,000 were Americans, a 34 percent increase in the first year after diplomatic relations were restored. That includes 330,000 Cuban-Americans visiting relatives. The rest were Americans who fit into one of 12 categories the U.S. government considers legitimate for travel purposes.
Information for this article was contributed by Carol Morello and Nick Miroff of The Washington Post and by Josh Lederman, Matthew Lee, Bradley Klapper and Rob Gilles of The Associated Press.
A Section on 09/30/2017