US President Barack Obama was received by Cuban President Raul Castro in Havana on Monday at the start of historic talks where the US leader will press his counterpart for economic and democratic reforms while hearing complaints about US sanctions.
Obama arrived in Cuba on Sunday on a trip that comes 15 months after he and Castro agreed to end five decades of Cold War-era animosity and work to normalize relations. On the first full day of his visit, he went to the heart of Cuba’s Communist system, laying a wreath in Revolution Square at the memorial to independence hero Jose Marti.
He moved on to the nearby Palace of the Revolution, where Castro and his predecessor, older brother Fidel Castro, have led Cuba’s resistance to U.S. pressure going back decades. A U.S. presidential visit to the inner sanctum of Cuban power would have been unthinkable before Obama and Raul Castro’s rapprochement in December 2014.
Marti was a 19th century poet and writer whose activism was key to winning Cuba’s freedom from Spain and whose legacy was later adopted by Fidel Castro’s revolutionaries as a symbol of anti-imperialism.
Obama and Castro have met three times before, but Monday’s meeting was set to be the most substantial. Obama and Raul Castro have deep differences to discuss as they attempt to rebuild the bilateral relationship.
As Castro and Obama stood shoulder to shoulder before their talks, a military band played the Cuban anthem and then the U.S. anthem. After the music, the two leaders walked past a military honor guard with fixed bayonets.
The formal ceremony contrasted with Obama’s lower key arrival by Air Force One in Havana on Sunday. Castro did not meet the plane and there were no military honors.
The U.S. president is under pressure from critics at home to push Castro’s government to allow dissent from political opponents and further open its Soviet-style command economy.
His aides have said Obama will encourage more economic reforms and greater access to the Internet for Cubans.
Ahead of his talks with Castro, Obama announced a deal that Google has reached with the island.
“One of the things that we’ll be announcing here is that Google has a deal to start setting up more Wi-Fi and broadband access on the island,” Obama told ABC News in an interview that aired on Monday. He gave no other details, and representatives for Google could not be immediately reached.
His administration hopes changes might also come at a Communist Party congress next month but doubts any political opening will be forthcoming.
Still, Obama has promised to talk about freedom of speech and assembly in Cuba. “I will raise these issues directly with President Castro,” he told the Cuban dissident group the Ladies in White in a March 10 letter.
Castro has said Cuba will not waver from its 57-year-old revolution. Government officials say the United States needs to end its economic embargo and return the Guantanamo Bay naval base to Cuba before the two nations can enjoy normal relations.
Cuban police backed by hundreds of shouting pro-government demonstrators broke up a Ladies in White march on Sunday, detaining dozens of people just hours before Obama landed.
EMBARGO DISPUTE:
Obama has urged Congress to rescind the 54-year-old embargo but has been rejected by the Republican leadership. He now has both Democratic and Republican elected officials with him on his Cuba trip and hopes Congress may act after the Nov. 8 presidential election.
One Cuban yelled “Down with the embargo!” during Obama’s tour of Old Havana, and the president responded by raising his right hand.
Asked about the potential for U.S. companies to lose out to other countries in the Cuban market, Obama told ABC: “There’s no doubt that we still have some work to do, and part of that is bringing an end to the embargo that is currently in place.” While it may not happen during his final year in office given the U.S. presidential election, “it is inevitable,” he added.
Thwarted by Congress on the embargo, Obama has instead used his executive authority to loosen restrictions on trade and travel with the Caribbean island.
Cuba has praised those measures but Castro will likely use the meeting on Monday to press Obama to go further.
