Aides say they expect the speech – in which Obama will address the issue of Cuba’s human rights record. among other matters – to be broadcast island-wide, and that so far Cuban officials have not objected to that.
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“There’s no shortage of opportunities for Americans to build that type of meaningful schedule or people-to-people engagement while they go to Cuba”, said Obama’s deputy national security adviser, Ben Rhodes. He’ll also meet with President Raul Castro at the Palace of the Revolution, interact with Cuban dissidents and attend a Major League Baseball exhibition game.
Obama is the first US president to visit Cuba since Calvin Coolidge’s trip in 1928.
The U.S. and Cuba are expected to resume scheduled commercial air flights, 110 flights a day, later this year.
USA banks also will be allowed to open accounts for Cuban nationals. He met this week with prominent Cuban Americans to listen to their hopes and concerns about the visit.
Outstanding U.S. property claims dating back to the early days of the Fidel Castro regime, as well as Cuba’s reparation claims, remain a continuing obstacle in the relationship between the two countries. “With a route network that offers the greatest number of flights in numerous largest US cities, United is ideally positioned to maximize customer choice and access”.
But Mr Rhodes could not confirm whether the event, which will take place at Havana’s legendary Gran Teatro, would actually be carried by Cuba’s state-run media, saying, “We’ll see how that transpires”.
The Obamas will arrive on Sunday night and travel to the Cathedral in Old Havana to meet with Cardinal Ortega, the archbishop of Havana, who was instrumental along with Pope Francis in helping forge the 17 December agreement to begin to normalise relations between the two countries.
But privately and pragmatically, most lawmakers acknowledge they do not expect 2016 will be the year they help the president knock down the barriers separating the US and Cuba since the Cold War. Obama’s administration has approved both ferries and cruises over the a year ago, but neither service has started. U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., challenged Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew during a congressional hearing on Tuesday.
“It remains very much a system of one party, a system in which you continue to have detentions of harassment of activists”, said Rhodes. “There’s going to be more dollars on the island, and we wanted to find a practical way for those dollars to be processed”.
John Caulfield, who served as the chief of the USA mission in Cuba from 2011 to 2014, said the change would expose Americans to a more authentic experience in Cuba than they have been able to get on organized tours.
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The Associated Press contributed to this article.
