Cubans sound unusually open to Kerry call for democracy

A report published the tabloid New York Post said the US is going out of its way not to offend the Cuban government by keeping dissidents away from the flag-raising.

The U.S. Secretary of State is the first to visit Cuba since Edward Stettinius did so in 1945.

In a joint press conference earlier Friday with Cuba’s foreign minister, Kerry said the U.S. was standing by its “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy with respect to migrants, saying there are “no plans whatsoever to alter the current migration policy”.

As a second generation of Cubans mainly born in the United States, however, comes of age and mortality takes its inevitable toll on the founding generation, attitudes in the Cuban community have shifted markedly.

A few hundred Cubans and tourists braved the intense August heat and tight security around the embassy to watch the US flag go up while a US Army band played the national anthem.

“Larry, Mike and Jim had done their jobs, but they also made a bold promise-that one day they would return to Havana and raise the flag again”, Kerry said. Castro marked his 89th birthday Thursday, with a newspaper column repeating assertions that the U.S. owes socialist Cuba?numerous millions of dollars? for damages caused by a decades-long embargo.

Washington imposed a full trade ban against Cuba in 1962.

Richard Blanco reads a poem at the official reopening at the U.S. Embassy in Havana in August. 15, 2015.

Mr Kerry’s visit to Cuba drew criticism from several leading Republicans, including presidential candidate Jeb Bush who said it was “a birthday present for Fidel Castro – a symbol of the Obama administration’s acquiescence to his ruthless legacy”.

Nonetheless, Kerry warned that the U.S. government retains the conviction that a “genuine democracy” in which the people can “freely elect their leaders” is the best choice for Cubans, while admitting that Cubans themselves are the ones who must “define their future”. In fact, the Castro brothers have not allowed any free elections, nor opposition parties, nor independent media for more than five decades.

On the most sensitive issue of political reforms, Vidal said Cuba will not give up anything to placate hardline opponents of Obama in the U.S. Congress or anti-Castro exiles in Miami.

Like other dissidents, he was not invited to the flag-raising ceremony but he did meet with Kerry at the US embassy residence.

“I wouldn’t want to miss it”, Marcos Rodriguez, 28, said as he waited outside the embassy.

“Kerry spoke about democracy, freedom, Wi-Fi, and he’s right”, Lopez said.

Retired Cuban diplomat Carlos Alzugaray said Friday’s events “had a great impact on people, who became enthused and started talking much more easily about those themes”, of democracy and liberty.

Soon after Kerry heads home Friday evening, diplomats who negotiated the embassy reopening will launch full-time into the next phase of detente: expanding economic ties between the two nations with measures like re-establishing direct flights and mail service.