Cubans welcome ease on travel restrictions

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Cubans in Havana welcomed a move by the US Congress on Tuesday to ease some of the trade and travel restrictions that had been imposed on their country by the US, but were hoping for even more opening up of relations under President Obama.

In a bill passed by the Congress, there are provisions that allow more frequent trips by Cuban-Americans to visit relatives still in Cuba and others that make it easier to sell certain agricultural and medical goods to the communist island nation.

Under the Bush administration, rules were put in place that strengthened the trade embargo against Cuba that has been in place for 47 years. Havana blames this Cold War policy for much of its ongoing economic difficulty.

“I’m happy they are easing the rules so the Cubans can come. Families should not have to suffer because of political disputes between governments,” said Havana teacher Hugo Alfonso in comments to Reuters.

“Cubans have suffered the embargo for many years and (President George W.) Bush tightened the rope. Now is the time to improve relations between the two countries,” he added.

There were mixed reactions in Miami from members of the Cuban exile community - split between those seeking more contact and normalizing of conditions and others who are strongly anti-communist and oppose any easing of sanctions while the Castros are in power.

Thanks to www.reuters.com for the above quotes, for more information on this article please visit their website.

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