Earlier this week, the US government said USA banks could process financial transactions from Cuba, and it eased some travel restrictions for Americans hoping to visit Cuba, allowing “people-to-people” visits instead of just costly tour groups.
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Cuban and USA flags are seen outside a restaurant in Havana, Cuba on Thursday.
Critics, including several Republican lawmakers, have faulted Obama’s overture to Cuba, saying the USA should continue to isolate the island by maintaining its economic embargo.
One Cuba expert who has advised the White House is Geoff Thale of the Washington Office on Latin America. The U.S. also is removing the requirement that American vessels maintain a higher level of security for access to ships while in Cuban ports.
Two years after taking power in 2008, Raul Castro launched economic and social reforms that appear slow-moving to many Cubans and foreigners, but are lasting and widespread within Cuban society. He is also expected to meet with dissidents, and the sports fanatic president will take in an exhibition game between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuban National team.
The invitation didn’t mention Obama, but the meeting will take place during his visit Tuesday morning.
Meanwhile, hundreds of workers have been scrambling for days to touch up building facades, patch potholes and spiff up Havana’s monuments ahead of the US President’s visit.
While the US embargo against Cuba remains in effect, the administration has been chipping away it over the last 15 months.
Diego Moya-Ocampos, senior analyst for IHS Country Risk, says Obama will be welcomed with open arms by the Cuban people.
“The list of people invited to meet with the president in Cuba is non-negotiable”, White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters in a daily press briefing.
The embargo limits how much business American companies can do in Cuba, and President Obama has acknowledged the embargo likely won’t be lifted by the end of his term. Still, Obama told Yahoo News a year ago, “Raúl Castro recognizes the need for change”, and wants to “help usher in those changes before he and his brother are gone”, leaving a successor without the clout to transform Cuba either politically or economically.
Yet Obama’s opponents insist he is rewarding a government that has yet to show it is serious about improving human rights and opening up its economy and political system.
“The new arrangement provides each country with the opportunity to operate up to 20 daily roundtrip flights between the United States and Havana”.
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If the emotive images of the Cuban Five – considered spies in the United States and heroes in Cuba – were incredible, far more incredible was the announcement that diplomatic relations between the two countries would be reestablished after more than 50 years of tensions.
