"State Sponsors of Terrorism" is a designation applied to countries that are alleged to have "repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism" per the United States Department of State. Inclusion on the list enables the United States government to impose four main types of unilateral sanctions: a restriction of foreign aid, a ban on weapons sales, heightened control over the export of dual-use equipment, and other miscellaneous economic sanctions.[1] The State Department is required to maintain the list under section 1754(c) of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019, section 40 of the Arms Export Control Act, and section 620A of the Foreign Assistance Act.
In 1979, the first such list was published by the State Department, designating Iraq, Libya, South Yemen, and Syria as terrorist states., the list consists of Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Syria.[2] The countries that were once on the list but have since been removed are: Iraq, Libya, South Yemen (dissolved in 1990), and Sudan. A resolution concerning the addition of Russia to the list was introduced to the senate following Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
| Timeline: U.S. State Department's "State Sponsors of Terrorism" | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 1979 | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | |
| < | --Libya 1979-2006--> | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Libya | < | --Iraq 1979-1982 1990-2004 --> | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Iraq | Iraq | < | --South Yemen 1979-1990--> | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| < | --Cuba 1982-2015, 2021-present --> | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Cuba | Cuba< | --Iran 1984-present --> | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| < | --North Korea 1988-2008 2017-present --> | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| < | --Sudan 1993-2020--> | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Sudan | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Cuba was added to the list on March 1, 1982, on the basis that it has a history of supporting revolutionary movements in Spanish-speaking countries and Africa.
Havana openly advocates armed revolution as the only means for leftist forces to gain power in Latin America, and the Cubans have played an important role in facilitating the movement of men and weapons into the region. Havana provides direct support in the form of training, arms, safe havens, and advice to a wide variety of guerrilla groups. Many of these groups engage in terrorist operations.
According to the U.S. Department of State, Cuba "encouraged terrorism in the hope of provoking indiscriminate violence and repression, in order to weaken government legitimacy and attract new converts to armed struggle." In 1992, after the Soviet collapse, Fidel Castro stressed that his country's support for insurgents abroad was a thing of the past.[3]
According to Country Reports on Terrorism 2010: August 18, 2011:[4]
On December 17, 2014, an agreement to restore relations with Cuba was reached (Cuban thaw); President Barack Obama instructed the Secretary of State to immediately launch a review of Cuba's inclusion on the list, and provide a report to the President within six months regarding Cuba's alleged support for international terrorism.[5] President Barack Obama announced on April 14, 2015, that Cuba was being removed from the list.[6] Cuba would not come off the list until after a 45-day review period, during which the U.S. Congress could try blocking Cuba's removal via a joint resolution.[7] Congress did not act, and Cuba was officially removed from the list on May 29, 2015.[8]
Cuba was readded to the list on January 12, 2021, with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo citing "repeatedly providing support for acts of international terrorism" by harboring U.S. fugitives as well as Colombian rebel leaders. Cuba's support for Nicolás Maduro in the presidential crisis, knowing the Maduro administration created "a permissive environment for international terrorists to live and thrive within Venezuela" was another reason for the redesignation.[9] The redesignation came just eight days before Donald Trump's presidency ended on January 20 at noon.
Iran was added to the list on January 19, 1984. According to Country Reports on Terrorism 2013:[10]
Mike Pompeo issued an official statement as the US Secretary of State on 12 January 2021, stating, "al-Qaeda has a new home base: it is the Islamic Republic of Iran."[11]
North Korea was added in 1988, following the 1987 bombing of Korean Air Flight 858 near Myanmar and re-listed again in 2017.[12] North Korea was initially added because it sold weapons to terrorist groups[13] and gave asylum to Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction members. The country is also responsible for the Rangoon bombing.
According to Country Reports on Terrorism: April 30, 2007:[14]
Terrorology specialist Gus Martin writes in his Understanding Terrorism: Challenges, Perspectives and Issues that "it is important to note that the State Department's list includes countries that have significantly reduced their involvement in terrorism, such as North Korea and Cuba. For example, North Korea was at one time quite active in attacking South Korean interests. In November 1987, North Korean operatives apparently destroyed Korean Airlines Flight 858, which exploded in Myanmar (Burma). The North Korean government has since renounced its sponsorship of terrorism."[15]
On April 13, 2008, Pyongyang agreed to dismantle the Yongbyon facility as part of an aid-for-disarmament deal. In response, on June 26, 2008, President George W. Bush announced that he would remove North Korea from the list. On October 11, the country was officially removed from the list for meeting all nuclear inspection requirements. The U.S State Department said it made the decision as Pyongyang had agreed to the verification of all of its nuclear programs, etc.
Despite requests from the South Korean government to put North Korea back on the list after it allegedly sank the Navy ship the ROKS Cheonan in 2010, the Obama administration stated that it would not do so because the act was conducted by only the North Korean military and was thus not an act of terror.[16] However, following the incident, the Obama administration also stated that it would then closely monitor North Korea for signs for a return to international terrorism. U.S. State Department spokesman P.J Crowley also said that returning North Korea to the list was under continual review.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated in 2009 that she was considering renaming North Korea on the List of State Sponsors of Terrorism.[17] As of 2016, North Korea, unlike the other countries removed and the designated state sponsor of terrorism Sudan, was still listed as not fully cooperating with the United States to fight terrorism.[18]
In February 2017, following the alleged state-sponsored murder of Kim Jong-nam (Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un's half-brother) using VX (banned under the international Chemical Weapons Convention, a convention which the North Korean government has not signed), pressure was placed on the Trump administration to revoke Bush's lifting of sanctions. In April 2017, U.S. Congress backed a bill to reinstate North Korea as a state sponsor of terror following the 2017 Shayrat missile strike in Syria, which North Korea had condemned vehemently.[19] In August of the same year, the nation launched a missile that flew over Hokkaido, Japan, promoting severe condemnation from other states. In September, the parents of Otto Warmbier, who had died after being imprisoned in the nation, stated that they want North Korea to be relisted for his apparent murder.[20] On November 20, 2017, President Trump officially announced the re-listing of North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism.[21]
Syria was added to the list on December 29, 1979. It is the only country from the original 1979 list to remain on the list, following Libya's removal in 2006.[22] According to 2021 edition of Country Reports on Terrorism published by the United States:[23]
In 2016, the US district court of Columbia declared that the financial and logistical support of the Syrian government was crucial for establishing a well-structured pathway for the fighters of al-Qaeda in Iraq in carrying out anti-American combat operations throughout the Iraqi insurgency. The court further stated that Syria "became a crucial base for AQI", by hosting several associates of Al-Zarqawi and leading commanders of the insurgency, and stated that Syria's policies "led to the deaths of hundreds of Americans in Iraq". The district court also found evidence of Syrian military intelligence assisting Al-Qaeda in Iraq and giving "crucial material support" to AQI militants who carried out the 2005 Amman bombings.[24]
In May 2022, Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) announced the introduction of the resolution calling on the Biden administration to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism for its war on Ukraine and conduct elsewhere under Vladimir Putin.[25] "Putin is a terrorist, and one of the most disruptive forces on the planet is Putin's Russia,"[26] said Graham, introducing the resolution.
Iraq was added to the list on December 29, 1979, but was removed in February 1982 to allow US aid to Iraq while it was fighting Iran in the Iran–Iraq War.[27] [28] It was re-added on September 13, 1990, following its Invasion of Kuwait.[29]
Libya was added on December 29, 1979. Then under the rule of Muammar Gaddafi, it was branded a sponsor of terrorism due to the government's support for several left-wing militant groups, such as the Provisional Irish Republican Army, the Basque Fatherland and Liberty, the Umkhonto We Sizwe, the Polisario Front, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, the Túpac Amaru Revolutionary Movement, the Palestine Liberation Organization, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, Free Aceh Movement, Free Papua Movement, Fretilin, Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front, Republic of South Maluku and the Moro National Liberation Front of the Philippines.[30] On May 15, 2006, the United States announced that Libya would be removed from the list after a 45-day wait period.[31] Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice explained that this was due to "...Libya's continued commitment to its renunciation of terrorism".[32]
South Yemen was added to the list on December 29, 1979. It had been branded a sponsor of terrorism due to its support for several left-wing terrorist groups..
The country was dropped from the list in 1990 after it merged with the Yemen Arab Republic (North Yemen) on May 22, 1990, to become the new Republic of Yemen.
Sudan was added to the list on August 12, 1993. American officials alleged that Sudan harbored members of the Abu Nidal Organization, Hezbollah, and Islamic Jihad.[33]
In October 2020, President Donald Trump announced that the United States would remove Sudan from the list following the ousting and subsequent removal of President Omar Al-Bashir, and an agreement with the new transitional government to pay $335 million in compensation to the families of victims of the 1998 United States embassy bombings.[34]
On December 14, 2020, the United States officially removed Sudan from the list.[35]
The sanctions which the US imposes on countries on the list are:
Michael F. Oppenheimer, professor at New York University's Center for Global Affairs, considers the State Sponsors of Terrorism list as a "negotiating tool" that, in the case of Iran, serves as a "bargaining chip," where the United States would "take them off as part of process of alleviating sanctions against Iran in exchange for what we're asking for in the nuclear agenda." Oppenheimer continues:
Countries that wind up on that list are countries we don't like [...] Other countries and outside powers support terrorism, and objectively speaking are terrorists, and the ones we don't like are on the list, and the ones we're allied with are not on the list. It's all about double standards.[39]
Linguist and political activist Noam Chomsky wrote that Iraq was removed from the list in 1982 "in order to permit the US to join the UK and others in providing badly needed aid for Saddam Hussein, continuing without concern after he carried out his most horrifying crimes." About Syria being in the list, Chomsky writes:Chomsky continued:
Returning to Iraq, when Saddam was removed from the list of states supporting terrorism, Cuba was added to replace it, perhaps in recognition of the sharp escalation in international terrorist attacks against Cuba in the late 1970s, including the bombing of a Cubana airliner killing 73 people and many other atrocities. These were mostly planned and implemented in the US [...] Washington was officially condemning the terrorist acts while harbouring and protecting the terrorist cells on US soil in violation of US law.
David Gewirtz, executive director of the US Strategic Perspective Initiative and a cyber-warfare adviser for the International Association of Counterterrorism & Security Professionals writes:
The U.S. Country Reports on Terrorism also describes "Terrorist safe havens" which "described in this report include ungoverned, under-governed, or ill-governed physical areas where terrorists are able to organize, plan, raise funds, communicate, recruit, train, transit, and operate in relative security because of inadequate governance capacity, political will, or both".[40] In the U.S. Annual report published in July 2017, which was mandated by the Congress titled "Country Report on Terrorism", the State Department listed numerous regions as "Terrorist safe havens."
In Africa, Somalia was listed as a country where Al-Shabaab finds safe haven, particularly in the Jubba River valley. The poorly-governed regions in the Trans-Sahara, in particular in Mali, is where terrorist groups have used territory to "organize, plan, raise funds, communicate, recruit, train, and operate in relative security." In Libya, porous borders and poorly cohesive security forces along with a large area of ungoverned territory have allowed for a "permissive environment" in which several terrorist groups can operate, such as Ansar al-Sharia, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Al-Mourabitoun, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
In the Middle East, parts of the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt, operations against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant – Sinai Province have made the northern part of the peninsula off-limits to tourists. In southern Lebanon, the government was reported to not be in control of "all regions" of the country, nor its borders with Israel and Syria, creating a space for Hezbollah to operate with "relative impunity," and the government has been noted to have made no attempt to disarm the group. Other groups such as the Al-Nusra Front and Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant have been noted to operate in mountainous regions of the country. In Yemen, numerous groups such as Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, ISIL operate due to a "political and security vacuum," and have been able to exploit the country's sectarian divide to gain support among Sunnis.
In South-East Asia, several islands in the Sulawesi Sea and Sulu Archipelago, difficult to govern lands have provided terrorist groups the ability to operate under the cover of "traditional smuggling and piracy groups." Abu Sayyaf, Jemaah Islamiyah, and the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters also operate in difficult to govern regions on the Mindanao island in the Philippines.
In South Asia, the border regions of Afghanistan and Pakistan are labeled "ungoverned areas" which terrorists have been able to exploit in order to conduct terrorist activities in both countries. The State Department stated that terror groups like the LeT and JeM continue to operate, train, organize, and fundraise openly inside Pakistan in 2016.[41] [42] [43] [44] Though the LeT is officially banned in Pakistan, its Jama'at-ud-Da'wah and Falah-e-Insaniat wings are not, although the JuD is "under observation" in accordance with the country's Schedule Two of the Anti-Terrorism Act.[45]
In the Western hemisphere, Colombia's dense rainforests and weak government presence along its international borders were noted to have allowed safe havens for terrorist groups such as the FARC to operate. "Credible reports" have stated that neighboring Venezuela has maintained a "permissive environment" for the activities of "known terrorist groups." In particular, they blame Nicolás Maduro and associates of using "criminal activities" to foster a "permissive environment" for known terrorist groups, including FARC, Hezbollah, and the National Liberation Army.[46]