Obama heralds embassy deal
President urges lifting of U.S-Cuba trade embargo
WASHINGTON — In a milestone accord, President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro agreed Wednesday to swiftly re-establish diplomatic relations and reopen embassies in each other’s capitals, finally ending the half-century diplomatic freeze between the two Cold War adversaries.
Standing in a sunny Rose Garden, Obama said many Americans and Cubans were making a “choice between the future and the past” and urged critics in Congress to do the same by lifting the decades-old U.S. trade embargo.
“Americans and Cubans alike are ready to move forward,” he said. “I believe it’s time for Congress to do the same.”
Restoring relations with Cuba after a 54-year rupture fulfills a major foreign policy goal for Obama, who called for improving ties when he first ran for the White House in 2008. It also removes one of the last vestiges of the Cold War more than a quarter of a century after it ended, although the U.S. economic embargo on Cuba remains in effect.
Obama and Castro traded letters confirming plans to reopen permanent diplomatic missions on July 20. Both leaders wrote that they were “encouraged by the reciprocal intention to develop respectful and cooperative relations between our two peoples and governments.”
Secretary of State John F. Kerry said that he would join the opening ceremony in Havana and that he looked forward to “raising the Stars and Stripes” over the embassy, noting that no U.S. envoy of his rank has visited there since 1945.
“This step has been long overdue,” Kerry said in Vienna, where he is participating in nuclear talks with Iran. Aides said Obama also hopes to visit Cuba before he leaves office in 2017.
Cuban TV took the unusual step of broadcasting Obama’s Rose Garden remarks live. Local newspapers, which often wait for official government pronouncements, blasted front-page headlines about the embassy openings early Wednesday.
Cuba’s acting foreign minister, Marcelino Medina, met with Jeffrey DeLaurentis, head of the U.S. Interests Section, to formally exchange documents. Both countries have operated lower-level diplomatic missions since the 1970s, but without full diplomatic ties.
The State Department is expected to upgrade the Interests Section, part of a multistory seaside building that previously served as the U.S. Embassy, rather than move into a new building.
“This is not merely symbolic,” Obama said. “With this change, we will be able to substantially increase our contacts with the Cuban people. We’ll have more personnel at our embassy. And our diplomats will have the ability to engage more broadly across the island. That will include the Cuban government, civil society and ordinary Cubans who are reaching for a better life.”