The stage was set Friday for a possible encounter between U.S. President Barack Obama and Cuban leader Raúl Castro at the VII Summit of the Americas and potentially the announcement that Cuba is off the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism.
As a prelude, the two leaders spoke on the phone Wednesday before Obama left Washington for Jamaica, according to the White House. He arrived in Panama for the summit on Thursday evening and was scheduled to meet with Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela Friday morning and then with Central American presidents.
This is the first time Cuba has been invited to the gathering of hemispheric leaders since the event was launched in 1994.
Wednesday’s phone call was only the second time U.S. and Cuban presidents have spoken by phone in more than a half-century.
Late Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and his Cuban counterpart Bruno Rodríguez also held a “lengthy and very constructive” meeting, according to a State Department official.
“The two agreed they made progress and that we would continue to work to resolve outstanding issues,” the official said.
At previous summits, the United States had become increasingly isolated over its Cuba policy.
“Particularly at this summit, symbolism matters,” said Shannon O’Neil, senior fellow for Latin American Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Moving hostility over U.S. Cuba off the table opens the door to more meaningful dialogue on other topics at the summit, she said.
The U.S. and Cuba have been in talks to normalize relations since December and on a visit to Jamaica on Thursday, Obama said he received a report from the State Department about Cuba’s status as a state-sponsor of terrorism and it’s being reviewed. There have been reports that the status change could be announced this week.
“The Obama administration should look to facts, not politics to guide their decision,” said South Florida Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who opposes removing Cuba from the list.
“A country cannot be removed from the list of state sponsors of terror if it continues to pursue the same policy of subversion and provides support for acts of international terrorism such as providing safe haven to foreign terrorists organizations and haboring U.S. fugitives,” she said Friday.
Among the fugitives from U.S. justice who have been granted political asylum in Cuba is Assata Shakur, also known as Joanne Chesimard. A Black Liberation Army member, she was convicted of the 1973 murder of a New Jersey state trooper and was serving a life sentence when she escaped from jail in 1979 and lived underground until she headed to Cuba in 1984.
Before meeting with Varela, the president got a quick tour of the Panama Canal, which is undergoing a $5.25 billion expansion to be able to handle the longer, wider and heavier post-Panamax ships that are increasingly being used by the world’s leading shipping lines.
Panama Canal Administrator Jorge Quijano said that expansion, set to open to commercial traffic in early 2016, is now about 87 percent complete, and that a stop by the president was logical because the United States is the canal’s top user.
With his jacket thrown over his shoulder and wearing sunglasses to beat the humid 88-degree heat, Obama visited the Miraflores locks and crossed a narrow walkway spanning the canal after visiting the control tower. Secret Service gunboats were stationed in the lock system near the section where the president crossed, according to White House Press pool reports.
Obama is expected to join the leaders of Panama, Brazil and Mexico at a CEO forum Friday afternoon.
But during the morning, Cuba once again took center stage as the Cuban delegation boycotted a parallel Forum on Civil Society over the presence of Cuban dissidents and activists who carried posters saying “Democracy is Respect.” There was a heated encounter between the two sides.
Some delegates from Argentina and Nicaragua said they were upset because Cuba had once again stolen the show.
Whitefield contributed to this report from Miami, and McClatchy correspondent Tim Johnson and el Nuevo Herald reporter Nora Gamez Torres contributed from Panama City.
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