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Statement by the Revolutionary Government of Cuba on Trump’s roll back of Presidents Obama’s Cuba initiative

Statement by the Revolutionary Government of Cuba
Submitted by editor on Sat, 06/17/2017 – 16:04

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On June 16, 2017, US President Donald Trump delivered a speech full of hostile anti-Cuban rhetoric reminiscent of the times of open confrontation with our country in a Miami theater. He announced his government’s Cuba policy, which rolls back the progress achieved over the last two years since December 17, 2014, when Presidents Raúl Castro and Barack Obama announced the decision to re-establish diplomatic relations and engage in a process towards the normalization of bilateral relations.

In what constitutes a setback in the relations between both countries, President Trump, gave a speech and signed a policy directive titled “National Security Presidential Memorandum”, which provides the elimination of private educational “people-to-people” exchanges and greater control over all travelers to Cuba, as well as the prohibition of business, trade and financial transactions between US companies and certain Cuban companies linked to the Armed Revolutionary Forces and the intelligence and security services, under the alleged objective of depriving us from income. The US president justified this policy with alleged concerns over the human rights situation in Cuba and the need to rigorously enforce the US blockade laws, conditioning its lifting, as well as any improvements in US-Cuba bilateral relations to our country’s making changes inherent to its constitutional order.

Continue reading Statement by the Revolutionary Government of Cuba on Trump’s roll back of Presidents Obama’s Cuba initiative

SILENT VIGIL demanding continued travel and engagement with Cuba.

New York – New Jersey CubaSi

Contact: Joan Gibbs – 718-789-1801 joanpgibbs2012@gmail.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New York 14 June 2017… On Thursday, June 15th hundreds of New Yorkers will gather at 4:30PM in front of Trump Tower – 725 5th Avenue at 56th Street –In a SILENT VIGIL demanding continued travel and engagement with Cuba.

On Friday President Donald Trumo is expected to announce his administration’s new “Cuba Policy” and has promised to overturn the moves toward full normalization with our closest neighbor to the South.

Late last month the conservative blog The Daily Caller reported that Trump was planning to make good on his campaign promise to “terminate” the Obama administration’s opening of engagement with Cuba. Just over two and a half years after the United States finally took steps to end more than half a century of hostility and restrictions on trade and travel, Trump wants us to go backwards.

Polls and statistics show that the majority of Washington policy-makers, as well as Cuban-Americans and U.S. Citizens at large, favor engagement with Cuba. So today we ask: Is it really “America First?” or Trump and the small power-hungry Cuban-American right wing FIRST?

We don’t want to return to the outdated, antiquated and cruel cold war policies of the past. We need friendship and peace in our hemisphere.

WE CANNOT SIT STILL!!!

Join us this Thursday – outside Trump Tower – at 4:30 PM – Let our legislators know we want to continue the path towards normalization with Cuba..

End the Travel Ban!!! End the Embargo!!!

Cruise industry committed to Cuba

Cruise industry committed to Cuba
In 2017, the island expects to receive three times more cruise passengers than last year

Author: Katheryn Felipe González | informacion@granma.cu
june 7, 2017 11:06:21

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Cuban port authorities are very conscientious of the loading capacities of each destination. Photo: Kimani Hernández.
Many experts define cruises as an exploratory form of tourism that, through short stays in each port, allows travelers to visit and learn about various destinations. Undoubtedly, it is a modality that at the very least is effective and solvent.

A particular feature of the Cuban tourist boom of recent years has been the increased arrival of cruise ships to the island. Of the more than four million tourists who visited Cuba in 2016, 112,000 arrived aboard cruises.

In fact, the cruise industry has been gaining in popularity globally. According to data from the World Tourism Organization, there are increasing numbers of cruise ships and other recreational vessels visiting the most diverse ports around the world.

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Cienfuegos is one of the Cuban ports offering international departures. Photo: Julio Martínez Molina
According to these figures, cruises are among the tourist modalities that have grown the most in Cuba and the Caribbean over the last five years. While the region receives an annual average of 50,000 vessels of all kinds, it also welcomes about 60% of the cruise ships operating on the planet Continue reading Cruise industry committed to Cuba

More than 50 senators support eliminating restrictions on travel to Cuba

CUBA

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MAY 26, 2017 12:27 PM
More than 50 senators support eliminating restrictions on travel to Cuba
BY NORA GÁMEZ TORRES
ngameztorres@elnuevoherald.com

As the Cuba policy review reaches its final stage, politicians, companies and organizations that support the policy of engagement are making an extra effort to send this message to Donald Trump: Mr. President, don’t eliminate opportunities to travel to the island.
Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) and Jeff Flake (R-Arizona) reintroduced a bill Thursday to eliminate all prohibitions on travel to Cuba. The bill, which had only eight cosponsors when first filed in 2015, now has the support of 55 senators from both parties.
“As the administration is finalizing its Cuba policy review, it is important to show that a bipartisan majority in the Senate supports not only not rolling back the measures that President Obama took to expand travel, but to go even further and remove all restrictions,” James Williams, president of Engage Cuba, told el Nuevo Herald. Engage Cuba is a coalition of companies and organizations that lobby to eliminate sanctions on Cuba.
The bill would remove all restrictions for U.S. citizens and residents on travel to Cuba, and will authorize associated banking transactions made by travelers. A similar proposal was presented in the House but with fewer sponsors.
Even if the bill is not discussed on the Senate floor, said Williams, it sends a strong message to the White House that there is support for the current policy of engagement.
In a separate move to push the agenda forward, another piece of legislation was introduced on Friday to lift the trade embargo. The Freedom to Export to Cuba Act of 2017 was introduced by Sens. Leahy, Flake, Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota) and Mike Enzi (R-Wyoming).

Continue reading More than 50 senators support eliminating restrictions on travel to Cuba