Cuba+Offers+to+Play+Baseball+for+Katrina+Victims,+NYT

=Cuba Offers to Play Baseball for Katrina Victims=

New York Times, December 22, 2005, Filed at 10:41 p.m. ET**
 * By REUTERS

Skip to next paragraph HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba said on Thursday it would donate its revenues from a world baseball tournament to Hurricane Katrina victims if the Bush administration reverses a controversial decision to bar Cuba's participation.

``The Cuban baseball federation, in an effort to find options, would be ready for the money corresponding to its participation in the classic to go to the victims of Hurricane Katrina left homeless in New Orleans,'' the federation said in a letter to U.S. Major League Baseball sent a week ago and released on Thursday.

The United States denied Major League Baseball a license that would allow Cuba to play in the inaugural World Baseball Classic in March on the grounds Cuba would reap the 1 percent of tournament revenues due each participant and 5 percent if it won.

Cuba on Thursday labeled the Bush administration's position as ``shameful and ``absurd and ``having nothing to do with sports.''

The decision also brought protests from the U.S. Olympic Committee, Major League Baseball, numerous politicians and others.

Puerto Rico's baseball federation announced on Thursday it would not host games if the Cubans were not allowed to participate.

The World Baseball Classic is an 18-day, 16-team World Cup-style tournament scheduled to begin on March 3 that will bring together some of the world's best baseball players on teams representing their home countries.

Cuban President Fidel Castro, an ideological foe of the United States for more than 40 years, had given the go-ahead for his Communist nation to participate.

But Cuba would have needed a special license from the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, which enforces the U.S. economic embargo against Cuba.

The Treasury Department refused to grant the license.

``Generally speaking, the Cuba embargo prohibits entering into contracts in which Cuba or Cuban nationals have an interest,'' Treasury spokeswoman Molly Millerwise said in a written statement.

The tournament starts in Tokyo and ends in San Diego and many of the games will be played in the United States, which has been a magnet for the defection of a host of Cuba's best players seeking multimillion-dollar big-league contracts.

Despite the drain of talent, Cuba won the gold medal for baseball at the 1992, 1996 and 2004 Olympics, falling to the United States in the finals at the 2000 Games.

=New Effort by M.L.B. for Cuba to Take Part=


 * By JACK CURRY, New York Times, December 22, 2005**

Major League Baseball renewed its effort yesterday to have Cuba participate in the inaugural World Baseball Classic in three months by resubmitting an application for a license with the United States Treasury Department. Last week, the Treasury Department denied the Cubans permission to play because they would have received revenue in violation of the Cuban embargo.

Discuss the Postseason Paul Archey, baseball's senior vice president for international matters, said the revised submission would guarantee that Cuba would not receive money from the United States for playing in the 16-team tournament. Archey said baseball and Cuban officials were investigating ways to distribute the money that Cuba would have made. It will probably be donated to charity.

"I'm very optimistic that we've addressed the concerns that the Department of Treasury had given us," Archey said. "We believe we've addressed them to fall within the guidelines they asked."

Archey said the application was delivered yesterday to the Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control.

Molly Millerwise, a spokeswoman for the Treasury Department, said in an e-mail response that it was against policy to comment on individual applications.

In revising its application, baseball officials explained how they would pay for travel and lodging costs for the Cuban team but that the Cubans would not receive financial benefits. Archey noted that the arrangement would be the same as when other Cuban athletes had competed in the United States. For instance, the Cuban soccer team played here under similar conditions last July. "We certainly think that by doing this and based on the history with other sports, we have addressed the areas they indicated were problematic," Archey said.

Israel Roldan, the president of the Amateur Baseball Federation of Puerto Rico, was quoted yesterday in the newspaper Primera Hora that he had sent a letter to the International Baseball Federation saying that Puerto Rico was renouncing its decision to be a tournament host because Cuba was being excluded "for reasons not regarding sports or Olympic spirit."

Archey said he had read the report, but he added, "I haven't heard anything directly from anyone in Puerto Rico that they're not going to host the games."

Aldo Notari, the president of the International Baseball Federation, told The Associated Press that it would be Major League Baseball's responsibility to remove Puerto Rico as a host.

Representative Lincoln Diaz-Balart, a Republican from South Florida who implored the Treasury Department to deny a license for Cuba, is trying to help assemble a team of Cuban players who are currently in the United States to represent the country.

Yesterday in Miami, Rene Arocha, the first Cuban player to defect, and a few others, spoke of their desire to play for Cuba in the tournament. Liván Hernández, Orlando Hernández and José Contreras, three pitchers who all defected from Cuba, may be recruited as well.

But Archey said that a Cuban team comprising players who are living in the United States would not be permitted to compete because it would violate tournament rules.

The International Baseball Federation, which is sanctioning the tournament, has said that baseball federations must pick teams in each country or commonwealth. The Cuban federation would choose its national team, not an independent team of Cubans who had left the country to play here.

Under the tournament rules, the national federation of each team is guaranteed at least a 1 percent share of net revenue. That percentage increases as teams advance, with the champion receiving 10 percent. In baseball's new application, Cuba would not receive anything, not even the 1 percent. Archey declined to discuss the financial arrangements or estimate how much money the percentages could be worth.

Because every team was guaranteed money, baseball officials planned to give the Cuban team proceeds, too. But they quickly learned that that was a serious gaffe. During discussions with Cuban officials on changing the license, Archey said, the officials were familiar with the process and understood why it needed to be amended.

"They view themselves, rightfully so, as world champions and the Olympic champions," Archey said. "They want every opportunity to play in this tournament. They don't want this to deny them."

Cuba announced that it would donate its revenue to Hurricane Katrina victims, according to Reuters.

Although Archey said he would like a speedy resolution of the latest application, he was unsure how long it would take the Office of Foreign Assets Control to review it. It took more than a month for baseball officials to learn that Cuba's original application was denied.

In an e-mail message, Millerwise wrote, "O.F.A.C. turns around all license requests as quickly as they are able to."

The tournament is scheduled for March 3-20, but 60-man rosters are due Jan. 17, so there is some urgency to determining Cuba's fate. Cuba is in Pool C in the tournament and is scheduled to play its first game March 8 against Panama in San Juan, P.R.