Airline fined for flying over Cuba

A U.S. airline company was fined the hefty sum of $100,000 for paying the Cuban government in order to fly over the country’s airspace. According to the U.S. Treasury Department, Spirit Airlines violated the embargo on the island by making the payments to Cuba without obtaining a “special license” from the federal government.

Meanwhile, a group of sixteen Florida-based travel agencies which book trips to Cuba have sued the state. The coalition of travel agencies are upset at a law which is supposed to take effect on Tuesday and designed to increase regulations on businesses:

The measure, sponsored by state Rep. David Rivera as a homeland-security issue, was drafted to apply to all Florida-based vendors selling trips to countries on the U.S. State Department's list of nations that sponsor terrorism -- which includes Cuba.

''It is unfortunate that certain state of Florida legislators have decided to waste taxpayer funds to further their own goal of preventing and hindering Cuban-Americans who desire to visit their families in Cuba,'' said Steven Weinger, one of the lawyers involved in the lawsuit against the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

Online site Travelocity was fined $183,000 last year for booking over 1500 trips from the U.S. to Cuba.

Image- wisebread

Sources- The Latin Americanist, miamiherald.com, cbs4.com, nbc6.net, local10.com