INTERNATIONAL: Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday 17th May the U.S. economic embargo on Cuba was a "genocidal policy," raising the stakes in a standoff with Washington over its treatment of the Communist-ruled Caribbean island.
Lopez Obrador, a leftist who has repeatedly called for the United States to end the embargo, said earlier in May that he would not attend the U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas next month unless all countries in the region were invited.
Speaking at a regular government news conference, Lopez Obrador said the United States "looked bad" in how it was treating Cuba and urged Washington to end the embargo.
Still, he welcomed moves announced by the U.S. government on Monday that will ease some Trump-era restrictions on the island and increase the processing of U.S. visas for Cubans.
Lopez Obrador on Wednesday is due to meet with a U.S. delegation for the Summit of the Americas in which he plans to explain why Mexico wants all countries in the region to attend.
Cubans optimistic after U.S. eases restrictions. 'It will make life better.'
Cubans in Havana on Tuesday 17th May celebrated the Biden administration´s decision to ease Trump-era restrictions on remittances and travel to the island, a crack in the door that comes as its communist-run government wrestles with the economic crisis and a mass exodus of its citizens to the United States.
Cuban citizen Rafael Verdecia said the decision will make life better for his countrymen at home and abroad, hoping for better relationships between both countries.
The measures, announced on Monday, mark the most significant changes in U.S. policy to Cuba since President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, but stop well short of the historic rapprochement under former President Barack Obama.
Among Cubans on the island desperate to reunite with loved ones in the United States, the announcement that the U.S. would restart a visa program aimed at bringing together families was hailed as a blessing.
But it made clear that the United States would not remove entities from the Cuba Restricted List, a State Department list of the Cuban government- and military-aligned companies with whom U.S. firms and citizens are barred from doing business.
