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Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | US politicians meet 'fit' Castro - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...7988865.stm

Cuba US Fidel Castro

shared by Argos Media on 08 Apr 09 - Cached
  • Members of the US Congress have held a rare meeting with the Former Cuban President Fidel Castro, describing him as very engaging and energetic.
  • Analysts say the meeting indicates an increased willingness on the part of Cuba and the US to resolve tensions.
  • The three members of the Congressional Black Caucus said the 82-year-old revolutionary leader asked how Cuba could help President Barack Obama normalise relations between the two countries.
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  • A seven-strong team of congressional Democrats is currently in Cuba, looking into ways to improve US-Cuban relations, but only three of them attended the meeting with Mr Castro.
  • President Obama is expected to announce soon that he is easing restrictions imposed in 2004 by George W Bush on travel and remittances for Cuban-Americans. Last week, a bill was introduced to Congress which would allow unrestricted travel to Cuba for all Americans.
  • in an article published on Sunday, Fidel Castro said his country was not afraid to talk to the US.
  • But no-one is yet expecting the lifting of America's 50-year-old trade embargo on Cuba, our correspondent adds.
Argos Media

Obama: 'We can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction' - CNN.com - 0 views

edition.cnn.com/...index.html

US Cuba Obama Hugo Chavez Raul Castro

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • President Obama said Friday he is seeking "a new beginning" in U.S. relations with Cuba.
  • the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba."
  • Obama said that "decades of mistrust" must be overcome, but noted that he has already loosened restrictions that limited Americans from traveling to visit relatives in Cuba and from sending money to them. Obama lifted all restrictions Monday on the ability of individuals to visit relatives in Cuba, as well as to send them remittances.
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  • "I am prepared to have my administration engage with the Cuban government on a wide range of issues -- from human rights, free speech and democratic reform to drugs, migration and economic issues," he said.
  • "Let me be clear: I am not interested in talking for the sake of talking. But I do believe that we can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction."
  • They come a day after Cuban President Raul Castro said he was prepared to discuss "everything, everything, everything" with the United States. Castro told a summit of leftist Latin American leaders gathered in Venezuela, "We are prepared, wherever they want, to discuss everything -- human rights, freedom of the press, political prisoners," Castro said Thursday.
  • Chavez's press office said Obama walked up to Chavez to greet him, a meeting it called "historic." "President Chavez expressed his hope that relations between the two countries would change," the press office said, quoting Chavez as having told his U.S. counterpart, "Eight years ago with this same hand I greeted Bush. I want to be your friend." It said Obama then thanked Chavez.
  • Obama's push for a rapprochement with Havana is supported by most Americans, 71 percent of whom said they favor re-establishing diplomatic relations, according to a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll carried out April 3-5.
Pedro Gonçalves

Organisation of American States decides to readmit Cuba | World news | guardian.co.uk - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...cuba-oas-usa

Cuba Organization of American States US

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 04 Jun 09 - Cached
  • The Organisation of American States tonight lifted Cuba's half-century-old suspension in a dramatic decision to bring Havana back into Latin America's diplomatic fold.The pan-regional body rebuffed the United States, which lobbied against the move, and revoked a 1962 cold war measure which had marked the communist island as a pariah.
  • Cuba said it had no interest in rejoining the OAS, which Fidel Castro this week called a "Trojan horse" for US interests, but the opening of the door was a diplomatic victory for Havana and exposed Washington's isolation.
  • Much of Latin America once considered Castro an anachronistic despot but since the 1990s the "maximum commandante" has won respect as an elder statesman and symbol of Latin American nationalism. Only the US still lacks diplomatic relations with the island.
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  • The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, said Havana should not be readmitted until it made concessions on democracy and human rights, a line echoed by the advocacy group Human Rights Watch which said political prisoners and repression continued under President Raul Castro.
  • Those arguments were swept away by largely leftist governments who thought the organisation had been beholden to Washington for too long. "The vote to readmit Cuba to the OAS represents an unprecedented assertion of Latin American power in a hemispheric institution long dominated by the US," said Daniel Erikson, an analyst at the Inter-American Dialogue thinktank and author of The Cuba Wars.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | Obama offers Cuba 'new beginning' - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8004798.stm

US Obama Cuba Hugo Chavez Raul Castro Organization of American States

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • President Barack Obama has said the US seeks a "new beginning" with Cuba and an "equal partnership" with all the nations of the Americas.
  • Mr Obama was addressing Latin American and Caribbean leaders at the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago. The summit follows a thaw in US-Cuban relations. Cuba is not at the summit.
  • Earlier, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton welcomed an offer for talks from Cuban President Raul Castro, saying the old US policy had failed. Mr Castro said on Thursday that he was ready to talk about "everything" with the US, including human rights, political prisoners and freedom of the press. His comments came after the US eased its long-standing embargo of the communist nation, allowing Cuban-Americans to visit relatives in Cuba and send money home more easily.
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  • Speaking to leaders gathered in Port of Spain, Mr Obama declared: "The US seeks a new beginning with Cuba."
  • "I know there is a longer journey that must be travelled to overcome decades of mistrust, but there are critical steps we can take toward a new day," he said.
  • Cuba is excluded from the summit, which includes 34 members of the Organisation of American States (OAS), though Latin American leaders have been calling for the communist country to be readmitted.
  • speaking on Friday in the Dominican Republic, Mrs Clinton acknowledged that US policy towards Cuba had "failed" and said Washington was "taking a very serious look at how to respond."
  • Addressing the summit, Mr Obama said he wanted to move forward with a sense of "equal partnership" with all the nations of the Americas despite decades of mistrust.
  • Mr Obama earlier greeted and shook hands with Venezuela's President, Hugo Chavez, during an impromptu meeting. Photographs released by the Venezuelan government showed Mr Chavez - one of the Bush's administrations most strident critics - smiling and clasping hands with Mr Obama at the start of the summit.
  • Before the summit began Mr Chavez appeared to chastise the US for its approach to Cuba, which is not a member of the OAS. In a pre-summit statement, he also said that "there is more democracy in Cuba than in the United States". But he greeted the US president warmly when the opportunity arrived, gripping the Mr Obama's hand in welcome. "I greeted Bush with this hand eight years ago; I want to be your friend," Mr Chavez told Mr Obama, according to a Venezuelan presidential press office statement.
Argos Media

Obama Calls for Thaw in U.S. Relations With Cuba - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...18prexy.html

US Cuba Organization of American States Hugo Chavez Cristina Kirchner Lula da Silva Daniel Ortega

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • President Obama, seeking to thaw long-frozen relations with Cuba, told a gathering of Western Hemisphere leaders on Friday that “the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,” and that he was willing to have his administration engage the Castro government on a wide array of issues.
  • in another twist, Cuba’s strongest ally at the summit, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, no fan of the United States, was photographed at the meeting giving Mr. Obama a hearty handclasp and a broad smile.
  • Cuba is not on the official agenda here; indeed, Cuba, which has been barred from the Organization of American States since 1962, is not even on the guest list. But leaders in the hemisphere have spent months planning to make Cuba an issue here.
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  • This week, the president opened the door to the discussions by abandoning longstanding restrictions on the ability of Cuban-Americans to travel freely to the island and send money to relatives there.
  • “I know there is a longer journey that must be traveled in overcoming decades of mistrust, but there are critical steps we can take toward a new day,” Mr. Obama said, adding that he was “prepared to have my administration engage with the Cuban government on a wide range of issues — from human rights, free speech, and democratic reform to drugs, migration, and economic issues.”
  • He said the United States needed to acknowledge long-held suspicions that it has interfered in the affairs of other countries. But, departing from his prepared text, he also said the region’s countries needed to cease their own historic demonization of the United States for everything from economic crises to drug violence.“That also means we can’t blame the United States for every problem that arises in the hemisphere,” he said. “That’s part of the bargain. That’s the old way, and we need a new way.”
  • On Cuba, the president’s words were as notable for what he said as for what he did not say. He did not scold or berate the Cuban government for holding political prisoners, as his predecessor, George W. Bush, often did.
  • But he also did not say that he was willing to support Cuba’s membership in the Organization of American States, or lift the 47-year-old trade embargo against Cuba, as some hemisphere leaders here want him to do.
  • “Let me be clear,” he said. “I am not interested in talking for the sake of talking. But I do believe we can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction.”
  • The new tone from Washington drew warm praise from leaders like President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of Argentina and President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua. Mr. Ortega, who said he felt ashamed that he was participating in the summit meeting without the presence of Cuba, evoked images of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, saying, “I am convinced that wall will collapse, will come down.”
  • Mrs. Kirchner praised Mr. Obama for “what you did to stabilize the relationship from the absurd restrictions imposed by the Bush administration,” adding: “We sincerely believe that we in the Americas have a second opportunity to construct a new relationship. Don’t let it slip away.”
  • Mr. Obama’s speech on Friday night was only the latest in a string of overtures between the countries. On Thursday, Raúl Castro, Cuba’s president, used unusually conciliatory language in describing the Obama administration’s decision to lift restrictions on family travel and remittances.
  • “We are willing to discuss everything, human rights, freedom of press, political prisoners, everything, everything, everything they want to talk about, but as equals, without the smallest shadow cast on our sovereignty, and without the slightest violation of the Cuban people’s right to self-determination,” Mr. Castro said in Venezuela during a meeting of leftist governments meant as a counterpoint to this weekend’s summit meeting in Trinidad and Tobago.
  • On Friday, Mrs. Clinton responded, saying, “We welcome his comments, the overture that they represent, and we’re taking a very serious look at how we intend to respond.”
  • Earlier this week Brazilian officials signaled in Rio de Janeiro that President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, potentially flanked by the Colombian president, Álvaro Uribe, would raise the issue of accepting Cuba into the Organization of American States at the summit meeting. Cuba’s “absence is an anomaly and he is waiting for this situation to be corrected,” Marco Aurélio García, Mr. da Silva’s foreign policy adviser, told reporters.
  • On Friday, the secretary general of the O.A.S., José Miguel Insulza, said he would call for Cuba to be readmitted. And Mr. Chávez recently said he would refuse to sign the official declaration produced at the summit meeting because Cuba was not invited.
Argos Media

Obama will use spring summit to bring Cuba in from the cold | World news | The Observer - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...cuba-obama-administration

Cuba US Embargo Castro Obama

shared by Argos Media on 09 Mar 09 - Cached
  • The White House has moved to ease some travel and trade restrictions as a cautious first step towards better ties with Havana, raising hopes of an eventual lifting of the four-decade-old economic embargo.
  • The administration has moved to ease draconian travel controls and lift limits on cash remittances that Cuban-Americans can send to the island, a lifeline for hundreds of thousands of families.
  • The legislation would allow Americans with immediate family in Cuba to visit annually, instead of once every three years, and broaden the definition of immediate family. It would also drop a requirement that Havana pay cash in advance for US food imports.
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  • Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, is expected to tell Obama on a White House visit this week that the region views the US embargo as anachronistic and vindictive. Easing it would help mend Washington's strained relations with the "pink tide" of leftist governments.
  • "It would signal new pragmatism, but you would still have the embargo, which is the centrepiece of US policy," said Erikson.
  • Wayne Smith, a former head of the US Interest Section in Havana, famously said Cuba had the same effect on American administrations as the full moon had on werewolves.
  • Recognising Castro continuity, and aghast at European and Asian competitors getting a free hand, US corporate interests are impatient to do business with Cuba. Oil companies want to drill offshore, farmers to export more rice, vegetables and meat, construction firms to build infrastructure projects.
  • Young Cuban exiles in Florida, less radical than their parents, have advocated ending the policy of isolation. As a senator, Obama opposed the embargo, but as a presidential candidate he supported it - and simultaneously promised engagement with Havana.
  • Compared to intractable challenges in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East, the opportunity for quick progress on Cuba has been called the "low-hanging fruit" of US foreign policy.
Argos Media

Haass: Why Obama Should Lift the Cuba Embargo | Newsweek International | Newsweek.com - 0 views

www.newsweek.com/...188147

Cuba US Richard Haas Cuban Embargo

shared by Argos Media on 12 Mar 09 - Cached
  • There are signs that change may finally be coming to Cuba, 50 years after the revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power. In a major shakeup, Raúl Castro, Fidel's brother, fired several high-level officials last week
  • Some American conservatives maintain that all this is reason enough for the United States to persist in its policy of ignoring Cuba diplomatically and sanctioning it economically. At least in principle, one could argue that the revolution is running out of steam and that regime change from within may finally be at hand. The problem is that this argument ignores Cuban reality. The country is not near the precipice of collapse. To the contrary, the intertwined party, government and military have matters well in hand. The population, ensured basic necessities along with access to education and health care, is neither inclined to radical change nor in a position to bring it about.
  • The American policy of isolating Cuba has failed. Officials boast that Havana now hosts more diplomatic missions than any other country in the region save Brazil. Nor is the economic embargo working. Or worse: it is working, but for countries like Canada, South Korea and dozens of others that are only too happy to help supply Cuba with food, generators and building materials.
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  • The policy of trying to isolate Cuba also works—perversely enough—to bolster the Cuban regime. The U.S. embargo provides Cuba's leaders a convenient excuse—the country's economic travails are due to U.S. sanctions, they can claim, not their own failed policies. The lack of American visitors and investment also helps the government maintain political control.
  • There is one more reason to doubt the wisdom of continuing to isolate Cuba. However slowly, the country is changing. The question is whether the United States will be in a position to influence the direction and pace of this change. We do not want to see a Cuba that fails, in which the existing regime gives way to a repressive regime of a different stripe or to disorder marked by drugs, criminality, terror or a humanitarian crisis that prompts hundreds of thousands of Cubans to flee their country for the United States.
Pedro Gonçalves

US couple charged with spying for Cuba | World news | guardian.co.uk - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...us-couple-cuba-spying

US Cuba Spying

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 06 Jun 09 - Cached
  • A retired US state department official with top security clearance, and his ­elderly wife, have been arrested and charged with spying for Cuba for 30 years.Walter and Gwendolyn Myers were so well regarded by Havana that several years ago they were rewarded with a secret meeting with Fidel Castro in Mexico.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | Clinton admits Cuba policy failed - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8005153.stm

US Cuba Cuban Embargo Hillary Clinton Organization of American States Raul Castro

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said that US policy towards Cuba has failed, welcoming an offer to talk from the Cuban president.
  • She said the US was "taking a serious look" at how to respond to President Raul Castro's comments, which she called an "overture". Mr Castro had said he was ready for discussions covering human rights, political prisoners and press freedom. The US passed a law this week easing restrictions on Cuban Americans.
  • The move will allow Cuban Americans to visit relatives in Cuba and send money home more easily.
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  • Mrs Clinton made her comments about Cuba in the Dominican Republic, ahead of the Summit of the Americas that begins in Trinidad and Tobago later on Friday. "We are continuing to look for productive ways forward because we view the present policy as having failed," she said at a press conference.
  • Cuba is excluded from the summit, which includes 34 members of the Organisation of American States (OAS), though Latin American leaders have been calling for the communist country to be readmitted. OAS Secretary-General Jose Miguel Insulza said on Friday he would ask the organisation's members to readmit Cuba, 47 years after it was suspended.
  • Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said he would veto the final declaration from the OAS summit because of Cuba's exclusion.
Pedro Gonçalves

granma.cu - Our defense is much stronger - 0 views

www.granma.cu/...defense.html

US Cuba Rumsfeld Bush Raul Castro

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 04 Jul 09 - Cached
  • the author relates in another book, Bush at War, that during a meeting of the U.S. National Security Council, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld proposed, with the consent of Vice President Cheney, to mount a massive attack on Cuba. Woodward adds that Bush not only agreed with the proposal but also asked for a detailed plan to be presented as fast as possible. "It was one of the most dangerous moments our country has gone through since the 1962 missile crisis," Raúl affirmed.
  • That situation led to an extraordinary plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party on July 15, 2003, and to the decision to increase and speed up measures aimed at strengthening the country’s defense in every aspect, based on a renewed, rational and realistic approach. Three years later, on July 1, 2006, the Fifth Plenum confirmed the results obtained and ratified and improved the strategy charted.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | Obama eases curbs on Cuba travel - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...7997063.stm

US Cuba Cuban Embargo

shared by Argos Media on 14 Apr 09 - Cached
  • US President Barack Obama has approved measures that will allow Cuban Americans to travel more freely to Cuba, his spokesman has said. Cuban-Americans will also be allowed to send more money to relatives in Cuba.
  • "The president has directed the secretaries of state, treasury and commerce to carry out the actions necessary to lift all restrictions on the ability of individuals to visit family members in Cuba and to send them remittances," said Mr Gibbs.
  • Restrictions would also be lifted on US telecommunications companies applying for licences to operate in Cuba, Mr Gibbs added.
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  • That move could open the way for a greater flow of information to the island via the internet, says the BBC's Kevin Connolly in Washington, although much will depend on the attitude of the Cuban government itself.
  • The US president has indicated he would be open to dialogue with Cuba's leaders. But he has said that, like previous American presidents, he will only consider a full lifting of the US embargo once Cuba's communist government makes significant moves such as the holding of democratic elections.
  • Cuba's President Raul Castro has said he is prepared to negotiate with the new US administration, providing there are no preconditions.
  • President Obama clearly believes that engagement may yet achieve what the half-century embargo never did, says our correspondent: real political change in Cuba. But there is no talk for the moment of opening diplomatic relations or of lifting the general trade embargo, he adds.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | US Congress members in Cuba talks - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...7986899.stm

US Cuba

shared by Argos Media on 07 Apr 09 - Cached
  • Raul Castro has held talks with members of Congress in his first face-to-face meeting with US politicians since he became president last year.
  • Barack Obama is expected to ease some of the travel and economic restrictions imposed on Cuba nearly 50 years ago.
  • Last week, a bipartisan group of US senators introduced a bill that would allow all US citizens to travel freely to Cuba for the first time since 1962. Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan said the policy had "failed for 50 years", adding that he believed it would win enough votes in the US Congress to pass.
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  • At present, the US only allows its citizens to go to Cuba if they are journalists, government officials or on a humanitarian mission. Students or people wanting to visit close relatives can also apply for special licences.
Argos Media

Obama opens crack in U.S. embargo against Cuba | Reuters - 0 views

www.reuters.com/...idUSTRE53C3O620090414

Cuba US Cuban Embargo Obama

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama opened a crack on Monday in a decades-old U.S. embargo against communist Cuba, allowing American telecommunications firms to start providing service for Cubans and lifting restrictions on family ties to the island.
  • In a major shift from the Bush administration's hard-line approach to Havana, Obama ended limits on family travel and money transfers to their homeland by Cubans in the United States.
  • U.S. officials said Obama hoped the new measures would encourage Cuba's one-party state to implement democratic reforms long demanded by Washington as a condition for removing sanctions imposed after Fidel Castro took power in 1959.
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  • U.S. telecommunications companies will now be allowed to set up fiber-optic cable and satellite links with Cuba, start roaming service agreements and permit U.S. residents to pay for telecoms, satellite radio and television services provided to people in Cuba, the White House said.
  • Obama also directed his government to look at starting regularly scheduled commercial flights to Cuba. Air travel between the United States and Cuba is now limited to charter flights.
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