CARICOM urges US to lift Cuba embargo

The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) yesterday renewed its call for the United States to end its decades-old trade and economic embargo against Cuba, as Havana promised never to forget the role played by four Caribbean countries in establishing diplomatic relations with the Communist state 39 years ago.

CARICOM chairman and St Kitts and Nevis prime minister, Dr Denzil Douglas, told the fourth CARICOM-Cuba summit that the regional grouping was using the occasion to reiterate its call for "the United States to heed the overwhelming call of the members of the United Nations to lift, with immediate effect, the unjust economic, commercial and financial embargo imposed against the Republic of Cuba".

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Washington imposed the embargo on Havana Cuba in October 1960 after Cuba nationalised the properties of United States citizens and corporations soon after Fidel Castro came to power in a military coup.

Cuban President Raul Castro told the opening ceremony that Havana would also 'never forget' the support of the Caribbean to put an end to the trade and economic embargo "imposed against our noble people by the United States government more than five decades ago".

He said it is an embargo that "remains essentially unchanged", and that the measures outlined by the Obama administration "have not gone beyond a partial relaxation of the restrictions limiting remittances and travel to the island of Cuban citizens living in the United States".