Scheduled Commercial Flights to Cuba? Not So Fast

Re-establishing diplomatic relations is one of several “key pillars in the president’s new approach to Cuba”, the White House noted this summer.

Mr. Obama says both countries have taken important steps in that year to normalize relations.

President Barack Obama with Cuba’s president, Raul Castro, at the Summit of the Americas in April.

December 17th marks the anniversary of the first year of the release of Alan Gross, the return of three Cuban prisoners unjustly jailed in US prisons and for the first time presidents from both Cuba and the United States live on their respective television networks speaking about the same thing and both on the same page.

American has been flying to Cuba the longest of any US carrier, starting charter service to the island in 1991.

November 2: Telecom giant Sprint becomes the first United States company to sign a deal to provide a direct roaming mobile phone service for foreigners visiting Cuba.

American Airlines, United, JetBlue and Delta Air Lines are among the carriers which have expressed interest in restarting commercial scheduled services to Havana.

Nevertheless, the State Department noted that “US law continues to prohibit travel to Cuba for tourist activities”.

After decades of embargo, flights will soon resume between Cuba and the United States.

Engle said the USA was pushing for boundless flight opportunities, yet the Cubans needed to set up a limit because of concerns their air terminals couldn’t deal with such a high volume of travelers.

“We continue to have differences with the Cuban government”, Obama said, “but we raise those issues directly, and we will always stand for human rights and the universal values that we support around the globe”.

Although it is likely to take some time before the start of commercial flights to Havana, the restoration of regular flights to Cuba after half a century would be the major business development since the two countries started to normalize their relations past year.

Speaking at a news conference in Havana, Cuba’s Director of US Affairs Josefina Vidal told reporters that the two countries were close to reaching a preliminary agreement.

Since Obama eased restrictions on travel, US visits to Cuba have climbed more than 70 percent, with 138,000 arrivals in the first 11 months of 2015.

Airlines will have to apply for permission from USA regulators to fly specific routes between the countries, and the timeline for this was not immediately clear.

“Sometimes I prefer to send them money instead of paying all the travel expenses”, she said.