US, Cuba agree to open commercial air links

A year after announcing the process of restoration of diplomatic relations between The United States of America and Cuba, the two governments came to an agreement on Thursday to restore commercial flights between the two countries.

The aviation deal opens the door for negotiations between US airlines and the Cuban government to hash out the details, which could take months.

Thursday marked one year since President Barack Obama announced the renewed diplomatic relations with Cuba.

On December 14, 15 and 16 the third round of technical talks on civil aviation between delegations from Cuba and the United States, including the establishment of scheduled flights between both countries, was held in Washington.

US teams played spring training games in Cuba before Fidel Castro’s revolution but none appeared here from March 1959 until the Baltimore Orioles faced Cuba’s national team in Havana in March 1999.

While flying to Cuba will become much easier and presumably less expensive, leisure tourist travel to the island is still illegal, and USA citizens are still only permitted to travel there for one of 12 approved reasons, including professional, educational, religious and humanitarian purposes.

The Fort Worth-based carrier has operated charter service to Cuba since 1991 and plans to apply for the new commercial routes to originate out of its Miami hub, although it could seek service from its other hub airports. Those daily flights would consist of 20 to Havana and up to 10 to other Cuban cities.

“The day that the president of the United States decides to visit Cuba, he will be welcome”, Josefina Vidal, director of US affairs in the Cuban foreign ministry, told reporters.

The move is the latest in a series of steps taken to cool off tensions between the two countries.

But those travelling have to do so using hard to book charter flights or via third countries.

While Puig is better known to the casual USA baseball fan, Abreu is more revered among Cubans, who consider him one of their greatest players ever. The Obama Administration’s removal of Cuba from the State Department’s list as a state sponsor of terrorism, manipulation of the facts regarding human trafficking to aid the Castros and neglecting Cuba’s valiant pro-democracy movement are just a few of the highlights of Obama’s shameful policy.

New Orleans and Cuba are less than 700 miles apart. The U.S. State Department said.

Flights to Cuba could begin within months.

Obama has about 400 days left in office before handing over to the next president, potentially a Republican hostile to his new Cuba policy.