U.S. Seeks To Normalize Relations With Cuba

This is absolutely wonderful news for the people of Cuba! :clap::clap::clap::clap::clap::clap:

Quote:

The United States and Cuba exchanged prisoners Wednesday as part of a deal to expand trade, increase travel, and normalize relations between the U.S. and its six-decade communist foe, government officials said Wednesday. "We will end an outdated approach that has failed to advance our interests," Obama said in making a formal announcement at the White House. "These 50 years have shown isolation has not worked." The biggest shift in the American-Cuban relationship since formal ties were severed in 1961 — the year the president was born — includes new rules for banking and financial dealings as well as a general easing of the U.S. embargo against Cuba and the opening of a U.S. embassy in Havana, said Obama and other officials. The biggest shift in the American-Cuban relationship since formal ties were severed in 1961 — the year the president was born — includes new rules for banking and financial dealings as well as a general easing of the U.S. embargo against Cuba and the opening of a U.S. embassy in Havana, said Obama and other officials. Obama said the decades-long embargo has had little effect on Cuba's regime, and that encouraging more engagement will help promote reform in the long run. He linked the move to the decision in the 1990s to normalize relations with Vietnam, with which the U.S. had fought a war. As Obama spoke, Cuban President Raul Castro -- brother of communist revolutionary leader Fidel Castro -- made a similar announcement in Havana. Echoing Obama, Castro said he welcomed new ties to the United States, though differences between the two countries remain. Obama and Raul Castro spoke by phone Tuesday about the agreement, officials said, the first direct contact between American and Cuban leaders since Fidel Castro led the communist revolution in 1959. (Fidel Castro, old and ailing, did not participate in the talks.) Among others who helped broker the deal, officials said: Pope Francis, who sent a letter on the subject to Obama and Raul Castro. Officials said that Obama and the pope discussed Cuba during the president's visit to the Vatican in March. The agreement includes Cuba's release of Alan Gross, an American citizen arrested in 2009 on espionage charges for trying to provide Internet service to Cuban residents. The U.S., meanwhile, agreed to release three Cubans accused of spying and imprisoned in the United States, officials said. U.S. officials said they also obtained the release of an un-named "intelligence asset" who had been imprisoned in Cuba for two decades. "This morning, Alan Gross has departed Cuba on a US government plane bound for the United States," an administration official said in a statement. "Mr. Gross was released on humanitarian grounds by the Cuban government at the request of the United States." Officials spoke on condition of anonymity, pending the formal announcement by Obama. Three members of Congress -- Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont; Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., and Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md. -- traveled to Cuba to secure Gross' release and accompany him on the trip home, according to a statement from Van Hollen's office. The party landed at an air base near Washington at around 11:30 a.m. ET.

U.S. seeks to normalize relations with Cuba

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