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State Dept Waited a Year to Set Up Panel Into Unexplained Attacks on U.S. Diplomats in Cuba
[Free Beacon] The State Department waited nearly one year before standing up an independent investigative panel, known as an Accountability Review Board, to probe the unexplained attacks on U.S. personnel working in Cuba and their family members.U.S. law requires the secretary of state to convene an ARB within 60 days after an incident of "serious injury" occurs to U.S. personnel serving abroad, which can be extended to 120 days if the secretary of state deems more time is needed. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson convened the board Dec. 11 and will formally notify Congress about its creation soon, Francisco Palmieri, the acting assistant secretary of state for western hemisphere affairs, told senators Tuesday during a Foreign Relations Committee oversight hearing on the attacks that on diplomats and other U.S. personnel in Cuba. Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), who led the hearing, repeatedly criticized the State Department for failing to form the ARB until December when the first symptoms that diplomats had been harmed in Cuba occurred in late 2016. Posted by: Besoeker 2018-01-10 |
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