REPUBLIC OF CUBA
Permanent Mission to the United Nations
315 Lexington Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10016
Press release:
US Department of the Treasury imposes a new fine on US and third-country companies.
New York, November 20, 2017. On November 17, the US Department of the Treasury announced that the financial firm American Express Company (AMEX) will pay a fine of 204,277 dollars for the alleged violation of the blockade against Cuba.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of this federal entity announced that the sanction is related to the possible liability of the Belgian company BCC Corporate SA (BCCC) for apparent violations of the Cuban Assets Control Regulations.
BCCC is a company that issues credit cards and corporate services to customers based in Europe, that “at the time of the apparent violations, BCCC was a wholly subsidiary of Alpha Card Group, which in turn was owned 50 percent by AMEX, a financial institution of the United States “.
OFAC reported that between April 9, 2009 and February 3, 2014, the credit cards that BCCC had issued to its corporate customers were used to make purchases in Cuba, contrary to the established laws that regulate the blockade of Cuba.
The new sanction joins others issued this year against US and foreign companies, and it is published just a week after the entry into force of additional restrictions on travel and trade with Cuba issued by the United States government.
The government of Donald Trump authorized these measures, despite the overwhelming rejection of the international community to such a policy, against which 191 nations in the United Nations pronounced on November 1.
(With information from Prensa Latina)
Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN
