This week Cuba made big headlines around the country, not once but twice. On Monday the White House announced the lifting of restrictions on travel and remittances for Cuban Americans; see our alert here.
Monday’s move by the Obama Administration not only fulfilled a campaign promise, but also ended an inhumane policy that tore families apart. See then-candidate Obama’s speech in Miami in August 2008 here. See LAWG/WOLA’s Love, Loss and Longing publication, which outlines the effect that the Bush Administration’s policies had on families on both sides of the Florida Straits here (pdf).
Now, as President Obama heads to Trinidad and Tobago where all of the leaders of Latin America, with the exception of Cuba, will meet at the Summit of the Americas, U.S.-Cuba relations again make headlines. See our page on the Summit here. See Phil Peters’ The Cuban Triangle for a round-up of headlines at http://cubantriangle.blogspot.com/ . Cuban President Raul Castro has issued a statement (see Reuters article here ) reiterating that Cuba welcomes dialogue – without restriction as to topic – with the United States, in response to President Obama’s statement in Mexico yesterday calling Monday’s lifting of restrictions for Cuban Americans “a show of good faith on the part of the United States that we want to recast the relationship” with Cuba. (AP video here.)
We wait with bated breath for the next development. Certainly there will be one.
