§6041 Withholding of foreign assistance from countries supporting Juragua nuclear plant in Cuba

Summary

The President must withhold U.S. foreign aid, starting March 12, 1996, from any country by an amount equal to the aid or credits that country gave on or after that date to help finish the Juragua nuclear power plant near Cienfuegos, Cuba. Congress found many safety and security problems: Cuba has not joined the Nuclear Non‑Proliferation Treaty or the Treaty of Tlatelolco; U.S. agencies raised concerns about the plant; a GAO report noted no strong Cuban nuclear regulator, weak infrastructure and operator training, a former technician’s report that 10 to 15 percent of examined welds were defective, exposure of key reactor parts after construction stopped on September 5, 1992, and a reactor dome that might hold only 7 pounds per square inch compared with normal atmospheric pressure of 32 and U.S. reactor designs of 50. The USGS said Cuba gave limited earthquake data, the Caribbean plate can cause big quakes (a 7.0 quake occurred on May 25, 1992), and NOAA warned that winds could carry radioactive fallout across much of the U.S. coast. A plan to finish the plant with Russia and others was under study. The withholding rule does not apply to certain kinds of help. Allowed aid includes urgent humanitarian help (like disaster and refugee relief), programs for democratic reform and rule of law, support to create independent private or nongovernmental groups, free‑market development, work covered by the Cooperative Threat Reduction Act of 1993, and the U.S. Information Agency secondary school exchange program. “Assistance” here means aid under the Foreign Assistance Act, credits, sales and credit guarantees, help under the Arms Export Control Act, Food for Peace titles I and III, the FREEDOM Support Act, and other U.S. aid programs.