US to allow Americans to send cellphones to Cuba
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| Published on Thursday, May 22, 2008 |
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By Jeremy Pelofsky
WASHINGTON, USA (Reuters): President George W. Bush announced an easing of restrictions on Wednesday to allow Americans to send mobile telephones to their families in Cuba, which he portrayed as a challenge to the Communist authorities to advance reforms.
Cuban President Raul Castro, who took over from his ailing brother Fidel Castro in February, has announced a series of economic changes in recent months, including allowing Cubans to buy computers, DVD players and mobile telephones. In practice, few on the island can afford them.
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| US President George W. Bush. AFP PHOTO |
"If Raul is serious about his so-called reforms, he will allow these phones to reach the Cuban people," Bush said.
"Through these measures the United States is reaching out to the Cuban people, yet we know that life will not fundamentally change for Cubans until their form of government changes," he said at a White House event on Cuba.
Washington has maintained a decades-long economic embargo against Cuba and the Bush administration has firmly upheld it, despite calls both in the United States and abroad to loosen it. Washington has been dismissive of prospects for political change under Raul Castro.
White House officials portrayed the change on mobile telephones as an extension to the US existing policy on sending family gift parcels rather than a crack in the embargo. The changes in US regulations will likely take effect in the next couple of weeks, said Dan Fisk, National Security Council senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs.
He said US telephones should work on the island, which lies 90 miles south of the Florida coast.
Fisk also told reporters that mobile telephones in Cuba cost an average of $120 plus another $120 to activate, but Cubans' average monthly wage is between $12-$20. But he did not say how much making calls cost.
In Havana, the Cuban government had not yet commented on Bush's announcement.
Bush also made it clear that there would be little change in policy toward Havana under Castro unless the Cuban people were given more freedom to speak, political prisoners were released and economic reforms were implemented.
"But experience tells us this regime has no intention of taking these steps," Bush said. "Instead, its recent gestures appear to be nothing more than a cruel joke perpetrated on a long-suffering people."
One Cuba analyst criticized Bush for being dismissive of the changes in Havana.
"It seems to me at a time when we're seeing real reforms in Cuba all the way from decentralization in agriculture to allowing Cubans new personal liberties, President Bush is wrong to dismiss these changes as a cruel joke, and he's wrong to position the United States against the process of change in Cuba," Sarah Stephens of the Center for Democracy in America said in a conference call.
Bush's announcement of the policy change coincided with scraps on the US presidential campaign trail between Republican candidate Sen. John McCain and Democratic rival Sen. Barack Obama over Cuba.
Trying to rally support among Cuban-Americans, who are a crucial voting bloc in Florida, McCain attacked Obama on Tuesday for his proposals to ease the embargo on Cuba.
Obama, who is likely to be the Democratic choice for candidate in November's election but is still battling Hillary Clinton for the nomination, has said he would like to ease stringent US restrictions on family visits and remittances from the United States. | | | | Reads : 249 | | | |
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