US allows US-owned factory to be set up in Cuba

For the first time since the Cuban revolution the U.S. has approved the first American-owned factory to be set up in Cuba. The two-man company based in Alabama will assemble as many as 1,000 small tractors a year for sale to private Cuban farmers.

The partners, Horace Clemmons and Saul Berenthal, claim they will be able to legally build tractors and other equipment in a special economic zone set up by the Cuban government to attract foreign investment. Cuban officials have been enthusiastic about the project and fully endorse it. The two partners expect to be building tractors in Cuba by 2017.

Clemmons said: "Everybody wants to go to Cuba to sell something and that's not what we're trying to do. We're looking at the problem and how do we help Cuba solve the problems that they consider are the most important problems for them to solve, It's our belief that in the long run we both win if we do things that are beneficial to both countries."

The plant will cost $5 to $10 million. This will be the first significant investment by the U.S. in Cuban since the revolution in 1959 which nationalized billions of dollars of US corporate and private property. This move provoked the embargo that prohibited almost all forms of commerce and even fined U.S. companies for doing business in Cuba.

On December 17, 2014 presidents Raul Castro and Barack Obama met and agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations and move also to normalize trade, travel, and other relationships. While the embargo still exists, Obama has used executive orders to carve out exceptions. The U.S. will now allow manufacturing at the Mariel port and special economic zone. The area is about 30 miles west of Havana. Another exception allows U.S. companies to export products that are of benefit to private and co-operative farmers in Cuba. However, Berenthal and Clemmons maintain they will sell their products only to the private sector.

A number of other moves indicate a lessening of tensions between the two countries and further liberalization in Cuba. The Cuban government intends to double the number of Wi-Fi access points to about 100 and also allow Cuban homes to have broadband. Formerly this was illegal. Soon regular flightsare planned between the U.S. and Cuba.

The new plant will be called the Oggun tractor plant. It will assemble parts into a durable and easily maintainable 25 horsepower tractor that will cost less than $10,000. The company believes it can sell hundreds of the tractors.

Berenethal was born in Cuba but left when he was 16. He met Clemmons from Alabama in the 1970s when both worked for IBM. They left and formed a successful cash register company that they sold at a considerable profit and Clemmons went into semi-retirement. They already have sufficient financial backing to begin the operation. The two believe they will be able to export the tractors to other Latin American countries that have no tariffs on Cuban products. They expect to earn between 10 and 20 percent on each tractor. Their company, Cleber LLC, based in Alabama already builds tractors for small farms. The company's attorney is already in Havana finalizing the agreement with the Cuban government. Berenthal said:"I have two countries that for 60 years have been in the worst of terms, anything I can do to bring to the two countries and the two people together is tremendously satisfying,..I think it'll have a tremendous impact on their ability not only to help their economy but to set an example across the Caribbean and Latin America,

While at first many of the components will be exported from the U.S. they hope to eventually manufacture many of the parts in Cuba. At the start, they plan to have 30 Cuban employees, but within five years they hope to have a many as 300. The men are already planning to expand into the production of backhoes, trench-diggers, and forklifts. Cuba is badly in need of such equipment. It is estimated that small private farmers now account for almost 70 percent of Cuba's agricultural production. Caterpillar is already selling earth-moving equipment through a distributor in Puerto Rico.

US and Cuba resume direct postal service after over half a century gap

After over a half century with no direct postal service between the U.S. and Cuba the two postal services will resume direct post. A pilot project will launch shortly but no date has been set for resumption of full service.

The move is part of a series of measures after US President Barack Obama and Raul Castro announced a renewal in relations back on December 17th of last year. Already, diplomatic ties have been established and embassies opened. The two countries began to re-establish postal relations back in 2013. Previously all mail to and from Cuba and the U.S. had to be routed through a third country, usually Mexico or Canada.

In March of this year, direct phone links were established between the two countries after a gap of 15 years. Calls previously were also routed through a third company making them quite expensive. The Cuban company Etecsa said: "The re-establishment of direct communications between the United States and Cuba contributes to providing better infrastructure and better communications quality between the people and our two countries." IDT Domestic Telecom in New Jersey will be Eteca's U.S. counterpart and said that the agreement would make it easier and more affordable for their American customers to call their friends and family still in Cuba.

The US broke off relations with Cuba back in 1959 after Fidel Castro with his brother Raul led a revolution and established a communist regime. While relations with the US have improved an embargo still exists but travel restrictions have been relaxed. Cuba insists that relations will not be fully normal until the US gives back Guantanamo Bay which is leased by the US in perpetuity:In 1934 a new Cuban-American Treaty of Relations reaffirming the lease granted Cuba and its trading partners free access through the bay, modified the lease payment from $2,000 in U.S. gold coins per year to the 1934 equivalent value of $4,085 in U.S. dollars, and made the lease permanent unless both governments agreed to break it or until the U.S. abandoned the base property.The US has indicated it will stay in the naval base even if the prison there is closed as Obama promised when he was first elected president.

Estimates put the yearly loss to the U.S. economy from the embargo at $1.2 billion but over the years Cuba has suffered a loss of more than a trillion dollars. While Obama wants the embargo lifted this would need to be approved by the US Congress that is controlled by Republicans. However, relations between the two countries still seem to be slowly but steadily improving.

UN condemns US embargo of Cuba for 24th time

The UN General Assembly for the 24th year condemned a U.S. trade embargo on Cuba. Only two countries voted against the resolution this time around, Israel and the United States.

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In spite of easing of tensions with Cuba, and renewed diplomatic ties, the United States voted against the resolution. There were 191 votes in favour of the resolution in the 193 member General Assembly with no abstentions. General Assembly resolutions are not binding but many claim they have some political influence. However, since the resolution has been passed every year for decades without the U.S. withdrawing sanctions, the influence on U.S. policy must be slight.

This July, the US and Cuba restored diplomatic relations after a break of over half a century. While Obama has eased trade and travel restrictions, only the U.S. Congress can lift the full embargo and that has yet to happen. In spite of the U.S. vote against the condemnation of the embargo Obama told the Assembly that he was "confident our Congress will inevitably lift an embargo that should not be in place anymore." Given that is his position, one would think that the U.S. would have voted to condemn the embargo to put pressure on the Congress. The U.S. earlier had suggested that it might abstain if the language differed significantly from earlier resolutions. The General Assembly has voted for the resolution ever since 1992. Last year there were three abstentions along with the Israel and US vote against the resolution but this year there were none. The US usually puts pressure on small countries to oppose or abstain when the resolution comes up. Last year it was Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Palau who abstained. This year they voted for the resolution.

The resolution was changed this year to welcome the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, and also noted Obama's expressed will to do away with the embargo. For some reason these changes did not convince the US that it should abstain. Ronald Godard US senior adviser for Western Hemisphere Affairs, said:"The text falls short of reflecting the significant steps that have been taken and the spirit of engagement President Obama has championed.If Cuba thinks this exercise will help move things forward in the direction both governments have indicated they wish, it is mistaken."

In other words, almost universal condemnation of the embargo will not help remove the embargo.

The Cuban government has made it clear that while they also want to improve ties with the U.S., full normalization would require not only a complete lifting of the embargo but the return of the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay. The U.S. has made it clear that the latter demand is not likely to be met in the near future. Even if the prison facility should be closed, the U.S. intends to keep the base.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said he was disappointed that the U.S. voted against the resolution. He said given that Obama has reversed the course on Cuba followed by 10 previous presidents, "one would have expected" he would vote in favour of the resolution. Reuters reports that Cuba estimates the economic damage to Cuba to be at $121 billion over the life of the embargo. The Times of Israel cites a much higher amount of $830 billion.

Obama facing opposition to opening embassy in Cuba

While Cuba and the United States reached a deal at the end of June to reopen embassies, Obama is facing opposition to the move both from his own party and Republicans.

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Sen. Robert Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey claimed the move is not in the U.S. national interest. On the Republican side, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arizona claimed the move to normalize relations with Cuba was "appeasement of dictators". The speaker of the House of Representatives, Republican John Boehner argues that U.S.-Cuba relations should not be revised at all, let alone normalized. Republican presidential candidate Sen. Lindsey Graham said he would make closing the embassy his top priority if elected president.

In order to normalize relations with Cuba, the White House needs Congress to agree to the move, approve an ambassador, lift the embargo on Cuba, and fund the embassy. Senator Cotton is planning, along with supporters in Senate, to try to block funding for the embassy, and also block approval of anyone nominated as ambassador. Cotton said he would continue to do so "until there is a real, fundamental change that gives hope to the oppressed people of Cuba." His Democratic ally Sen. Menendez said: “An already one-sided deal that benefits the Cuban regime is becoming all the more lopsided, The message is democracy and human rights take a back seat to a legacy initiative.”

Opposition to normalization is not new as the House already passed a motion to keep current travel restrictions on travel by Americans to Cuba, blocking Obama's attempt to ease the restrictions. The motion passed by a 247-176 vote. In another bill passed through the House, a bill funding the State Department at the same time prohibits the department from using the funds to build a new embassy in Cuba. The Obama administrations wants $6 million to upgrade a current building in Havana in order to turn it into a functioning embassy. A summary of the House bill said:“The bill includes a prohibition on funds for an embassy or other diplomatic facility in Cuba, beyond what was in existence prior to the President’s December announcement proposing changes to the U.S.-Cuba policy."

A senior State Dept. official criticized the opposition as being counterproductive: “It would be a shame if Congress impeded implementation of some of the very things that we think they – we all agree we want to do, such as better outreach to the Cuban people all over the island or additional..These are the kinds of things that we can do as we move forward in this relationship with a more robust embassy. And I would assume that most on the Hill agree those are a good thing to do.”

White House press secretary, Josh Earnest, told reporters that he thought that there was strong support for lifting the embargo on Cuba although he had not done a "whip count."

Obama has support on the Republican side even while many Republicans are critical of his policy. Senator Jeff Flake, a Republican from Arizona, said that changing policy towards Cuba was long overdue. Sen. Dean Heller of Nevada also praised Obama's moves as "a step in the right direction" although he said fundamental issues remained to be resolved. Senator Rand Paul, a Republican presidential candidate, has criticized the embargo in the past, pointing out that the U.S. trades with Vietnam and China, both nominally communist nations and noted that trade is better than war. If Paul supports Obama, he will be at odds with Sen. Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz who both oppose Obama's Cuba policies. Cruz said: "The word's coming out of the president's mouth simply aren't true. It makes no sense to be strengthening a profoundly anti-American enemy, a tyrant 90 miles from the U.S. shore."

There are few details about the timeline for opening the new embassy. State Department adviser, Marie Harf, said:“We really just don’t have any more details about where the process goes from here. We’ve had productive conversations. There are still some issues that need to be worked out. We don’t have more details about how that will happen,” Last week the U.S. removed Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Fidel Castro on Haitian Earthquake Aid

I did not realise that the US refused aid from Cuba during Katrina. As the article notes Cuba has been co-operating with the US aid allowing overflights of Cuba which shortens the flying time between Haiti and Miami by about 90 minutes. Castro admits that its own aid has been able to get through without being delayed. However as the article countries have noted US control of the airport seems to have caused them problems. There are also questions about the number of US troops being sent and whether they are all part of the humanitarian effort.



This is from motherjones.

Reflections by Comrade Fidel



WE SEND DOCTORS, NOT SOLDIERS.



In my Reflection of January 14, two days after the catastrophe in Haiti, which destroyed that neighboring sister nation, I wrote: “In the area of healthcare and others the Haitian people has received the cooperation of Cuba, even though this is a small and blockaded country. Approximately 400 doctors and healthcare workers are helping the Haitian people free of charge. Our doctors are working every day at 227 of the 237 communes of that country. On the other hand, no less than 400 young Haitians have been graduated as medical doctors in our country. They will now work alongside the reinforcement that traveled there yesterday to save lives in that critical situation. Thus, up to one thousand doctors and healthcare personnel can be mobilized without any special effort; and most are already there willing to cooperate with any other State that wishes to save Haitian lives and rehabilitate the injured.”

“The head of our medical brigade has informed that ‘the situation is difficult but we are already saving lives.’”

Hour after hour, day and night, the Cuban health professionals have started to work nonstop in the few facilities that were able to stand, in tents, and out in the parks or open-air spaces, since the population feared new aftershocks.

The situation was far more serious than was originally thought. Tens of thousands of injured were clamoring for help in the streets of Port-au-Prince; innumerable persons laid, dead or alive, under the rubbled clay or adobe used in the construction of the houses where the overwhelming majority of the population lived. Buildings, even the most solid, collapsed. Besides, it was necessary to look for the Haitian doctors who had graduated at the Latin American Medicine School throughout all the destroyed neighborhoods. Many of them were affected, either directly or indirectly, by the tragedy.

Some UN officials were trapped in their dormitories and tens of lives were lost, including the lives of several chiefs of MINUSTAH, a UN contingent. The fate of hundreds of other members of its staff was unknown.

Haiti’s Presidential Palace crumbled. Many public facilities, including several hospitals, were left in ruins.

The catastrophe shocked the whole world, which was able to see what was going on through the images aired by the main international TV networks. Governments from everywhere in the planet announced they would be sending rescue experts, food, medicines, equipment and other resources.

In conformity with the position publicly announced by Cuba, medical staff from different countries –namely Spain, Mexico, and Colombia, among others- worked very hard alongside our doctors at the facilities they had improvised. Organizations such as PAHO and other friendly countries like Venezuela and other nations supplied medicines and other resources. The impeccable behavior of Cuban professionals and their leaders was absolutely void of chauvinism and remained out of the limelight.

Cuba, just as it had done under similar circumstances, when Hurricane Katrina caused huge devastation in the city of New Orleans and the lives of thousands of American citizens were in danger, offered to send a full medical brigade to cooperate with the people of the United States, a country that, as is well known, has vast resources. But at that moment what was needed were trained and well- equipped doctors to save lives. Given New Orleans geographical location, more than one thousand doctors of the “Henry Reeve” contingent mobilized and readied to leave for that city at any time of the day or the night, carrying with them the necessary medicines and equipment. It never crossed our mind that the President of that nation would reject the offer and let a number of Americans that could have been saved to die. The mistake made by that government was perhaps the inability to understand that the people of Cuba do not see in the American people an enemy; it does not blame it for the aggressions our homeland has suffered.

Nor was that government capable of understanding that our country does not need to beg for favors or forgiveness of those who, for half a century now, have been trying, to no avail, to bring us to our knees.

Our country, also in the case of Haiti, immediately responded to the US authorities requests to fly over the eastern part of Cuba as well as other facilities they needed to deliver assistance, as quickly as possible, to the American and Haitian citizens who had been affected by the earthquake.

Such have been the principles characterizing the ethical behavior of our people. Together with its equanimity and firmness, these have been the ever-present features of our foreign policy. And this is known only too well by whoever have been our adversaries in the international arena.

Cuba will firmly stand by the opinion that the tragedy that has taken place in Haiti, the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, is a challenge to the richest and more powerful countries of the world.

Haiti is a net product of the colonial, capitalist and imperialist system imposed on the world. Haiti’s slavery and subsequent poverty were imposed from abroad. That terrible earthquake occurred after the Copenhagen Summit, where the most elemental rights of 192 UN member States were trampled upon.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, a competition has unleashed in Haiti to hastily and illegally adopt boys and girls. UNICEF has been forced to adopt preventive measures against the uprooting of many children, which will deprive their close relatives from their rights.

There are more than one hundred thousand deadly victims. A high number of citizens have lost their arms or legs, or have suffered fractures requiring rehabilitation that would enable them to work or manage their own.

Eighty per cent of the country needs to be rebuilt. Haiti requires an economy that is developed enough to meet its needs according to its productive capacity. The reconstruction of Europe or Japan, which was based on the productive capacity and the technical level of the population, was a relatively simple task as compared to the effort that needs to be made in Haiti. There, as well as in most of Africa and elsewhere in the Third World, it is indispensable to create the conditions for a sustainable development. In only forty years time, humanity will be made of more than nine billion inhabitants, and right now is faced with the challenge of a climate change that scientists accept as an inescapable reality.

In the midst of the Haitian tragedy, without anybody knowing how and why, thousands of US marines, 82nd Airborne Division troops and other military forces have occupied Haiti. Worse still is the fact that neither the United Nations Organization nor the US government have offered an explanation to the world’s public opinion about this relocation of troops.

Several governments have complained that their aircraft have not been allowed to land in order to deliver the human and technical resources that have been sent to Haiti.

Some countries, for their part, have announced they would be sending an additional number of troops and military equipment. In my view, such events will complicate and create chaos in international cooperation, which is already in itself complex. It is necessary to seriously discuss this issue. The UN should be entrusted with the leading role it deserves in these so delicate matters.

Our country is accomplishing a strictly humanitarian mission. To the extent of its possibilities, it will contribute the human and material resources at its disposal. The will of our people, who takes pride in its medical doctors and cooperation workers who provide vital services, is huge, and will rise to the occasion.

Any significant cooperation that is offered to our country will not be rejected, but its acceptance will fully depend on the importance and transcendence of the assistance that is requested from the human resources of our homeland.

It is only fair to state that, up until this moment, our modest aircrafts and the important human resources that Cuba has made available to the Haitian people have arrived at their destination without any difficulty whatsoever.

We send doctors, not soldiers!



Fidel Castro Ruz

January 23, 2010

5:30 p.m.

Cuba and US Co-operate on Haiti Relief

This just shows that co-operation between the two countries is possible. Too bad it takes a horrible disaster to make this happen. From this site.

Cuba Aids Haiti Relief


The massive international relief effort in Haiti has received a boost from Cuba, which has more than 400 health workers, many of them doctors, working throughout the devastated country. The government in Havana has also aided United States relief efforts by opening restricted Cuban airspace to American planes flying medical evacuation missions.

Shortly after the horrific earthquake struck Haiti January 12, causing untold destruction and killing tens of thousands of people, the U.S. reached agreement with Havana for evacuation flights from the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay to pass through Cuba on their way to Florida.

An understanding had been in place allowing individual emergency flights to travel through the area, but the new agreement expands that authority to a standing basis. Now planes that are carrying badly injured people for medical treatment in the U.S. won't have to be pre-cleared by Cuban authorities.

With Cuba situated on a direct line between Haiti and Florida, about 200 miles northeast of Port au Prince, the agreement cuts the flight time to Miami by 90 minutes. That could be vital in life-or-death medical emergencies. It also allows the U.S. to set up a medical airlift, or airborne convoys, to ferry the injured to hospitals on the mainland to relieve the badly overburdened medical facilities in Haiti.

President Barack Obama has pledged $100 million in aid to the ruined island nation, part of one of the largest international relief efforts in history. The bilateral cooperation between the U.S. and Cuba reflects our overwhelming concern for the welfare of the Haitian people. We will continue to look for areas where cooperation between our 2 nations can support Haitian relief.

Donations influence Cuba embargo support.

This is just one small example where it seems quite clear that donations have bought support. In many instances politicians changed their positions on the embargo and were rewarded with donations as a result. One might think that it would be mostly right wing Republicans who are getting all these donations but as the article shows this is far from the truth. Many democratic politicians are also feeding at the anti-Cuba trough. In fact since 2008 the Democrats have received over half of the donations!


Money talks: Report links donations, Cuba embargo support
By Lesley Clark McClatchy Newspapers
WASHINGTON — Supporters of the U.S. embargo against Cuba have contributed nearly $11 million to members of Congress since 2004 in a largely successful effort to block efforts to weaken sanctions against the island, a new report shows.

In several cases, the report by Public Campaign says, members of Congress who had supported easing sanctions against Cuba changed their position — and got donations from the U.S.-Cuba Democracy Political Action Committee and its donors.

All told, the political action committee and its contributors have given $10.77 million nationwide to nearly 400 candidates and members of Congress, the report says.

The contributions include more than $850,000 to 53 Democrats in the House of Representatives who sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi earlier this month opposing any change to U.S.-Cuba policy. The average signer, the report says, received $16,344.

The top five recipients of the embargo supporters' cash: Miami's three Cuban-American Republican members of Congress, 2008 Republican presidential nominee John McCain and New Jersey Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez, whose parents fled Cuba before his birth.

The report comes as defenders of the embargo fend off efforts to repeal a decades-old ban against U.S. travel to Cuba. Proponents of greater engagement with Cuba contend that they have the votes, and a hearing on the issue is scheduled for Thursday before the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Critics of U.S.-Cuba policy long have suggested a link between campaign contributions and policy. Public Campaign — which advocates for public financing of political campaigns — says the contributions raise questions about the role that money plays in lawmakers' decision-making.

"The pressure they get to raise money plays heavier in their decisions than it ought to," said David Donnelly, the national campaigns director for Public Campaign. "We think this is a damning pattern. We think these are good people caught in a bad system. If members of Congress have to spend too much time raising money, they have to listen to people who give money."

The director of the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC, Mauricio Claver-Carone, defended the contributions as support for lawmakers who side with Cuban-Americans who think that easing sanctions against Cuba will only benefit the Castro regime.

"I will not apologize for the Cuban-American community practicing its constitutional, democratic right to support candidates who believe in freedom and democracy for the Cuban people over business and tourism interests," Claver-Carone said. "Unions help elect pro-union candidates. The Chamber of Commerce helps elect pro-business candidates. AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) helps elect pro-Israel members. Who are we supposed to help? Pro-Castro members?"

Public Campaign looked at the Cuba committee because of a seeming disconnect between congressional votes and public opinion polls that suggest most Americans support lifting a ban on travel to Cuba, Donnelly said.

"On this issue there appears to be a clear distinction between what the American public appears to want and what some in Congress are advocating," Donnelly said, pointing to a World Public Opinion survey in April that found 70 percent of Americans support travel to Cuba.

Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., who backs greater engagement with Cuba, said the report wasn't a surprise.

"I don't know how else you can explain how our current policy has survived for so long without yielding any meaningful results; it's all politics," Flake said.

The report says that at least 18 House members — including several from agriculture-rich districts — received campaign contributions from the PAC or its donors and switched their positions on Cuba, from voting in favor of easing travel restrictions to voting against any efforts to soften the embargo.

Rep. Mike McIntyre, D-N.C., said his changed views came from humanitarian interests and concerns about oppression in Cuba. He said he spoke with Florida Republican Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart about their family's experience in Cuba under Fidel Castro.

"I thought, 'This is not right, and it's not humanitarian, and it doesn't promote democracy and I'm not going to support someone who is repressive and evil,' " McIntyre said. "Yes, I changed my vote. That's the reason I changed: the horrors they suffered."

"They're really savvy people," Lars Schoultz, a professor of political science at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and the author of "That Infernal Little Cuban Republic: The United States and the Cuban Revolution," said of the U.S.-Cuba Democracy PAC. "They know one vote is one vote. They scratch around and see who might be open to their way of thinking."

Claver-Carone, who started the PAC in 2003, said agricultural and business interests had heavily lobbied members of Congress before the committee was in operation.

"The farm lobby came in and they were telling people, 'Cuba is like Costa Rica,' " Claver-Carone said. "We came in and started telling people, 'Hey, here's what's really happening in Cuba.' "

Though hard-line embargo supporters traditionally have been considered Republicans, the report shows the PAC shifting contributions to Democrats as they assumed control of the House and Senate in 2006.

In the 2004 election cycle, the PAC gave just 29 percent to Democrats. By 2008, the Democrats' share was up to 59 percent.

(Barbara Barrett and David Goldstein contributed to this article

Obama Awakens Hopes for a Thaw in Cuba Relations

This is from antiwar.com.
Since Obama has pledged to ease travel restrictions, there could very well be considerable tourist traffic between the U.S. and Cuba as Cuban exiles visit their families back home. Since Obama is willing to talk to the Cubans without preconditions this could very well lead to further improved relations. No doubt many US businesses would not be averse to exploring new markets in Cuba. However given the present economic downturn in the US and more pressing issues that Obama will have perhaps not too much will happen in the near future.


Obama Awakens Hopes for a Thaw in Cuba Relations
by Patricia Grogg
HAVANA - US President-elect Barack Obama has a positive image among most Cubans, who are hopeful regarding his promises of loosening some restrictions towards the island, although the government-controlled media here have refrained from commenting on the future of relations between the two countries.
The Democratic candidate who will become the first African-American president of the United States on Jan. 20 may also become the first to sit down to talks with the Cuban government after nearly half a century of conflict.
During his campaign, Obama pledged to lift travel restrictions so that Cuban-Americans can visit their families in Cuba, and to eliminate caps on the remittances they can send back to their families -- measures that were adopted in 2004 by the Republican administration of President George W. Bush.
Obama also said he was willing to pursue direct diplomacy with the Cuban government, without preconditions.
"I hope that with him as president, relations will be eased, and there won't be so many restrictions," a 62-year-old woman told IPS, after complaining that in November 2007 she was refused a visa for the second time, on the argument that she posed a risk to US interests.
"My parents and siblings have lived over there for years, and I never had any problem visiting them before. But for the Bush administration I'm a danger, and I can't see my mother, who is 92 years old and sick and wants to see me," she added, asking not to be identified "to avoid further complicating matters."
A shift in Washington's policy towards Cuba would have several advantages for Cuban society, in the view of Reverend Raymundo García, director of the Christian Center for Reflection and Dialogue, one of the few civil society organizations in Cuba that regularly analyses human rights questions.
Obama's offer "to be open to dialogue with Cuba…is a watershed for his country and his government, because it would require a dismantling of what has been called an embargo based on democracy and human rights questions," he said.
The protestant minister said he had no doubts that a new attitude on the part of Washington would immediately contribute to bringing about closer ties between families divided between the two countries and would help the Cuban economy as a result of increased travel and remittances. "God willing, this will be the start of an end to the mutual recriminations, accusations and spitefulness that have caused so much harm," he said.
Academics who spoke to IPS, however, said they do not foresee significant short-term economic benefits, especially because of the financial crisis in the United States, which has already translated into a drop in remittances towards the rest of the Americas, as well as a reduction in travel due to soaring air ticket prices.
"Without a doubt, the situation could improve in the next few months, and that would be a positive signal, but for now, Obama's priority is to improve the US economy and rebuild the nation's prestige," economy Professor Omar Everleny Pérez Villanueva told IPS.
He also said, however, that he has no doubts that if the US Congress passes laws favorable to Cuba, Obama will not veto them. "He wouldn't have any reason to do so, and besides, the hard-line Cuban-Americans are Republicans, to whom Obama is not beholden."
Luis René Fernández, assistant director of the University of Havana's Center for the Study of the Hemisphere and the United States (CEHSEU), agrees that Cuba is not "a priority" on Washington's agenda, but said a new stance towards this Caribbean island nation could "be important for the world's perception of the United States."
"That is, small changes in the policy towards Cuba, a degree of flexibility, an openness to diplomatic negotiations, however limited, could help improve something crucial to US politics: the country's image, which has severely deteriorated after eight years of an administration that has been deeply unpopular at a global level," said Fernández.
In the analyst's view, a more pragmatic Cuba policy could provide "collateral benefits" to the government of Obama, who will take office only a few weeks after the Cuban government headed by Raúl Castro celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution, on Jan. 1, 2009.
Up to now, only former president Fidel Castro has publicly referred to the two candidates who faced off in Tuesday's elections. In his most recent column, he described Obama as "more intelligent, educated and level-headed" than his Republican rival, John McCain.
"Obama came to these elections with the backing of the dominant class in the United States," Ramón Sánchez-Parodi Montoto, international relations analyst and former head of the Cuban Interests Section in the United States wrote in an article Wednesday in Granma, the official newspaper of Cuba's governing Communist Party.
Opinions varied among dissident groups in Cuba. "I don't believe in proposals for dialogue with this government," Berta Soler, a member of the Ladies in White, a group of wives and daughters of imprisoned dissidents who were accused of "conspiring" with the United States, told IPS.
By contrast, Eloy Gutiérrez Menoyo said that for Cuba, the change that lies ahead in Washington could open up a new horizon of "infinite" possibilities and "would also be an opportunity for enriching dialogue with Latin America." Menoyo is the head of Cuban Change, which he describes as "an independent opposition organization."