Kerry to meet Cuban FM as Havana’s embassy opens in US

“This is very good, considering that past year we only grew by one percent”, he noted, adding that a growing number of more than half a million Cubans are now self-employed.

“As we have said, it is about founding a new kind of tie between both states, that is different from all our shared history”.

With the two longtime adversaries set to restore diplomatic relations on Monday after a 54-year break, Cuba said the United States would need to abandon its policy of regime change in order to improve overall ties.

Since taking over as president for his ailing brother in 2008, Raul Castro, the longtime defense minister, has proven less bellicose toward America than his brother, now 88 and retired.

The diplomatic official cited multimillion-dollar annual budgets for what are commonly called the Cuban democracy programs, which Cuba believes are Washington’s hostile efforts to undermine its government and socialist political system.

“We recognize the statement by the president, but you have to see the practical impact of what happens, don’t you?”

Mr Castro also declared that crucial to normalising relations would be the return to Cuban sovereignty of Guantanamo Bay, which has housed a USA naval base and the notorious extra-legal prison camp since Washington signed a treaty with the pre-revolutionary government in 1903.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said the flag will be hung early Monday before a ceremony to mark the reopening of the Cuban embassy in Washington, The Associated Press reported.

Secretary of State John Kerry will meet with Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez on Monday, according to the State Department, APA reports quoting Anadolu Agency.

Expected to attend the reopening ceremony in Washington are some 500 Americans, legislators among them, and a delegation of 30 Cubans, including officials and celebrities like singer-songwriter Silvio Rodriguez.

That led to a troubled history including a failed U.S.-organized invasion of Cuba by a force of exiles in 1961 and a thrust to the brink of nuclear war in 1962 over Soviet missiles stationed in Cuba.