Battling with Bacardi

10 April 2011
The battle for the ownership of the Cuba’s Havana Club rum trademark continues to rage on both sides of the Atlantic.

In February Cuba won a ruling when Spanish courts, for the third time, refused Bacardi’s attempt to challenge the ownership of the famous trademark Cuban rum in Spain. Ian FitzSimons, General Counsel, Pernod Ricard (who distribute the Cuban distilled rum in Europe) said: "This decision is a victory for the Havana Club brand.

This was a blatant attempt by our competitor, Bacardi, to claim rights in a trademark more than 30 years after an unused registration had expired."

However, in April the latest ruling of the US Court of Appeals stated that the "Havana Club" trademark Pernod Ricard SA uses for its rum in other parts of the world can't be used in the US.

In reaching this ruling, the US court used cited a 1998 law which relates to a “confiscated”business or trademark. This legislation was drawn up by former Assistant Secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere Otto Reich, who was advising Bacardi at that time, when the company was under litigation in New York for using illegally the Havana Club name.

Juan Gonzalez Escalona, head of the Cuban Rum Corporation said the ruling reinforced the economic, financial and commercial blockade the US has kept on Cuba for five decades. He explained that Cubaexport had registered Havana Club trademark in the United States in 1976 and gave the French beverage giant Pernod Ricard the rights to market it throughout the world.

http://www.cuba-solidarity.org.uk/

Outrage in El Paso: Posada Acquitted !!

In El Paso today, following a 13-week trial in which the evidence against him was overwhelming, notorious terrorist Luis Posada Carriles was acquitted by a jury after a shockingly short three hours of deliberation.

The U.S. government has been at war against the Cuban people since they carried out a revolution in 1959. As a CIA employee and part of that war, Posada Carriles committed many acts of terrorism against the Cuban people and others.

Today Posada walks free in a mockery of justice, while the Cuban Five
anti-terrorists are still imprisoned for almost 13 years.

If the U.S. had really wanted a conviction of Luis Posada Carriles on his real crimes of terrorism, it would have been easily achieved. But the U.S. government chose to try Posada for the ridiculously minor charges of perjury and immigration fraud.

This is why the National Committee, along with the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition and local activists in El Paso held a "Peoples Tribunal" and protest before the start of the federal trial, to expose Posada's crimes of terrorism to the world.

Today's acquittal, together with the continued incarceration of the Cuban Five heroes who risked their lives to prevent acts of terrorism by Posada's allies, is a clear indication that the U.S. war against the Cuban people and Cuban revolution continues.
The National Committee to Free the Cuban Five is outraged by this travesty of "justice," as are all supporters of Cuba and the Cuban Five.

The verdict of "not guilty" in Luis Posada Carriles's trial in El Paso does not absolve him of his terrorist crimes. And the struggle to bring Posada and his accomplices to justice does not end with today's verdict.

Demand Posada's Extradition!
Act today to demand justice for the 73 plane bombing victims,
for Fabio di Celmo, and for all the victims of U.S.-backed
anti-Cuba terrorism!




We urge everyone to contact the U.S. State Department and demand the immediate extradition of Posada to Venezuela, where he is wanted for the murder of 73 people in the mid-air bombing of Cubana Flight 455.

U.S. Department of State
2201 C Street NW
Washington, DC 20520
202-647-4000



http://www.freethefive.org

Jimmy Carter: "Release the Cuban Five"

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter is the highest-ranking official, former or current, who has just publicly called for the freedom of the Cuban Five.

He has just spent three days in Havana, where he gave an interview to Cuban journalist Arleen Rodríguez Derivet, and also a press conference to Cuban and international media earlier in the day. On both occasions, Carter took the opportunity to call for changes in U.S. policy -- an end to the blockade, normalization of relations, and freedom for the Cuban Five.

Some excerpts from Carter's comments:
"I believe that there is no reason to keep the Cuban Five imprisoned, there were doubts in the U.S. courts and also among human rights organizations in the world. Now, they have been in prison 12 years and I hope that in the near future they will be released to return home.

"I also have had a chance to meet with the parents of the so-called Cuban Five, with two of the mothers and also with three of the wives, and I expressed my feelings to them, and I hope that in the future they will be released, according to U.S. law.

"As you know I am not only a President. I am also a Nobel laureate. Well, in my private talks to President Bush and also with President Obama, I have urged the release of these prisoners.

"I recognize that there are restraints within the American judicial system. However, my hope is that the president would grant a pardon. You have to realize that this is a decision that can only be made by the president. It is presumptuous of me to try to tell another president what to do.

"But the Presidents, now and before this [Obama and Bush], have known that my own opinion is that the original trial of the Cuban Five was very doubtful, norms were violated, and also some of the restraints on their visitations have been overly restrictive. I know that all of the families have been able to visit them. My wish in the future, before a pardon might be granted, is that there would be more access of their families to these prisoners in the United States.

"I have been informed by officials, for instance, that the shooting down of the small plane over Havana that caused the death of two pilots was done after the president of the United States [Bill Clinton] informed the Cuban leaders that no more flights would take place. I was informed by Cuban officials that they expressed to the president very clearly that they could not permit a plane to fly over their capital city, dropping leaflets, that they would have to protect the sovereignty of Cuba. So even those more serious allegations, in my opinion, are very doubtful about their need or cause of the extensive sentences that have been granted to the prisoners."

"So in every way, in my private report with Obama when I return to the United States, in my public statements like today, in my previous conversations with American leaders, I've called for the release of the Cuban Five."

see press conference here

http://www.freethefive.org