The administration has relaxed other sanctions against the Communist state since Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro said in December 2014 that they would restore diplomatic ties after a freeze of more than five decades dating back to the Cold War.
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As more Americans travel to Cuba, these USA visitors “will be dropping more and more dollars in Cuba and Cuba wants to be able to spend them”, said Augusto Maxwell, a Miami attorney who heads Akerman’s Cuba practice.
“Today’s amendments build upon President Obama’s historic actions to improve our country’s relationship with Cuba and its people”, U.S. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker said in a statement. US banks will be allowed to process Cuban transactions that pass through the USA financial system. Specifically, he said the ability for Cubans to access the USA dollar through transactions that go through third-party countries “gives them greater incentives to have an economic model that evolves over time into one that is more open to global markets and worldwide business”.
The move is expected to help fill demand for commercial flights that USA airlines hope to initiate soon.
The Obama administration has announced changes regarding travel to Cuba. But the complete lifting of the embargo requires congressional action. Instead, he said, it would “give important benefits to Cuban nationals looking to live and work in the United States without forcing them to make the decision to defect to the United States”.
The United States is also poised to ease security restrictions for ships coming from Cuba bound for American ports, USA officials told The Associated Press.
The Obama administration announced Tuesday it was relaxing travel and financial restrictions on Cuba ahead of the president’s historic trip to the island next week. “We deeply believe that this is in America’s national interests”.
Changes will allow Cubans to open U.S. bank accounts and authorise those living in the United States to earn salary or compensation.
The current workforce participation in Cuba’s private sector is now 11 percent, Gross said, and the country needs direct foreign investment in order for it to grow. Previously, Americans had to visit the island in groups that planned out their itineraries to make sure they were complying with US government regulations.
The U.S. eliminated a ban on Cuban access to the worldwide banking system.
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The White House just made it a lot easier for Americans to visit Cuba and for USA companies to do business there. Yet the USA trade embargo that Congress enacted after Cuba’s 1959 revolution remains in place.
