More than a half century of Cold War and lingering enmity came to an abrupt, but quiet end yesterday as the US and Cuba restored full diplomatic relations.
The new era began with little fanfare when an agreement between the two nations to resume normal ties yesterday came into force just after midnight Sunday and the diplomatic missions of each country were upgraded from interests sections to embassies.
Without ceremony in the pre-dawn hours, maintenance workers were to hang the Cuban flag in the lobby of the US Department of State alongside those of other nations with which the US has diplomatic relations.
HISTORIC SHIFT
The historic shift was to be publicly memorialized later yesterday when Cuban officials formally inaugurate their embassy in Washington and Cuba’s blue, red and white-starred flag was to fly for the first time since the countries severed ties in 1961. US Secretary of State John Kerry was to meet his Cuban counterpart, Bruno Rodriguez, and address reporters at a joint news conference.
The US Interests Section in Havana was to announce its upgrade to embassy status in a written statement yesterday, but the Stars and Stripes will not fly at the mission until Kerry visits next month for a ceremonial flag-raising.
The Cuban Interests Section in Washington switched its Twitter account to say “embassy,” one of a series of similar changes being made to the two country’s social media accounts.
Conrad Tribble, deputy chief of mission for the US in Havana, tweeted: “Just made first phone call to State Dept. Ops Center from United States Embassy Havana ever. It didn’t exist in Jan 1961.”
And yet, though normalization has taken center stage in the US-Cuba relationship, there remains a deep ideological gulf between the nations and many issues still to resolve. Among them: thorny disputes such as over mutual claims for economic reparations, Havana’s insistence on the end of the 53-year-old trade embargo and US calls for Cuba to improve on human rights and democracy.
Some US lawmakers, including several prominent Republican presidential candidates, have vowed not to repeal the embargo and pledged to roll back US President Barack Obama’s moves on Cuba.
Still, yesterday’s events cap a remarkable change of course in US policy toward the communist island under Obama, who had sought rapprochement with Cuba since he first took office and has progressively loosened restrictions on travel and remittances to Cuba.
SECRET TALKS
Obama’s efforts at engagement were frustrated for years by Cuba’s imprisonment of US Agency for International Development contractor Alan Gross on espionage charges. However, months of secret negotiations led in December to Gross’s release, along with a number of political prisoners in Cuba and the remaining members of a Cuban spy ring jailed in the US.
On Dec. 17, Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced they would resume full diplomatic ties.
On July 1, the US and Cuba exchanged diplomatic notes agreeing that the date for the restoration of full relations would be July 20.
“It’s a historic moment,” longtime Cuban diplomat and analyst Carlos Alzugaray said.
“The significance of opening the embassies is that trust and respect that you can see, both sides treating the other with trust and respect,” Alzugaray said. “That doesn’t mean there aren’t going to be conflicts — there are bound to be conflicts — but the way that you treat the conflict has completely changed.”
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