Democratic front-runner Barack Obama sought to toughen his position on meeting such US foes as Cuban President Raul Castro, outlining his conditions in a delicate pitch aimed at winning over an important voting bloc in the November presidential elections.
Obama's speech on Friday to the Cuban American National Foundation — a foray into delicate political waters — sought to counter stepped-up criticism from rival John McCain. Obama, with an insurmountable lead over rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, is increasingly appearing as the Republican’s challenger for the White House.
On Friday, Obama picked up five more delegates, including one who switched allegiance from Clinton. With an almost 200-delegate lead over the former first lady, Obama is just 61 delegates short of the 2,026 needed to clinch the nomination.
McCain also took on a politically sensitive subject, releasing medical records aimed at easing concern that at 71 years old, he is too old to be president. The records showed that the three-time melanoma survivor appears cancer-free, has a strong heart and is in general good health.
Obama’s speech to the Cuban group came three days after McCain ridiculed him in Florida for saying he would meet Castro. Obama had said in a debate last year that he would meet without preconditions with the leaders of Cuba, Iran and Venezuela — all US adversaries.
The first-term Illinois senator said McCain has been “going around the country talking about how much I want to meet with Raul Castro as if I’m looking for a social gathering. That’s never what I’ve said and John McCain knows it.”
Obama said he would meet Castro only at a time and place of his choosing and when there is “an opportunity to advance the interests of the United States and to advance the cause of freedom for the Cuban people.”
He said he would maintain the existing trade embargo to use as leverage for winning democratic change in Cuba. But he said he would lift restrictions on family travel and remittances to the island. The audience of Cuban-Americans applauded his remarks.
Obama was addressing a group known for its tough line against former Cuban president Fidel Castro. But in recent years, frustrated with the lack of change on the island, it has entertained some more moderate views.
DEATH CONSTANTLY LOOMING: Decades of detention took a major toll on Iwao Hakamada’s mental health, his lawyers describing him as ‘living in a world of fantasy’ A Japanese man wrongly convicted of murder who was the world’s longest-serving death row inmate has been awarded US$1.44 million in compensation, an official said yesterday. The payout represents ￥12,500 (US$83) for each day of the more than four decades that Iwao Hakamada spent in detention, most of it on death row when each day could have been his last. It is a record for compensation of this kind, Japanese media said. The former boxer, now 89, was exonerated last year of a 1966 quadruple murder after a tireless campaign by his sister and others. The case sparked scrutiny of the justice system in
The head of Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, was sacked yesterday, days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he no longer trusts him, and fallout from a report on the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack. “The Government unanimously approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to end ISA Director Ronen Bar’s term of office,” a statement said. He is to leave his post when his successor is appointed by April 10 at the latest, the statement said. Netanyahu on Sunday cited an “ongoing lack of trust” as the reason for moving to dismiss Bar, who joined the agency in 1993. Bar, meant to
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
‘HUMAN NEGLIGENCE’: The fire is believed to have been caused by someone who was visiting an ancestral grave and accidentally started the blaze, the acting president said Deadly wildfires in South Korea worsened overnight, officials said yesterday, as dry, windy weather hampered efforts to contain one of the nation’s worst-ever fire outbreaks. More than a dozen different blazes broke out over the weekend, with Acting South Korean Interior and Safety Minister Ko Ki-dong reporting thousands of hectares burned and four people killed. “The wildfires have so far affected about 14,694 hectares, with damage continuing to grow,” Ko said. The extent of damage would make the fires collectively the third-largest in South Korea’s history. The largest was an April 2000 blaze that scorched 23,913 hectares across the east coast. More than 3,000
RSS