May 23, 2009 8:41 am US/Eastern
Obama Asks Cuba To Restart Immigration Talks
Plan immediately denounced by S. Florida Republicans
WASHINGTON (CBS4) ―
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President Barack Obama speaks at the National Archives May 21, 2009, in Washington, D.C. Obama made his case on the closing of Guantanamo Bay detention facility after the Senate and the House have both voted no to grant his request.
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President Obama's administration has taken another step towards improving relations with the Cuban regime of Raul Castro. The White House has asked Cuba to resume talks on legal immigration of Cubans that former President Bush suspended in 2003.
The move to restart the talks was made by the State Department on Friday. State Department officials said the talks would focus on "safe and orderly migration" by Cubans to the United States, according to the Associated Press.
The Obama plan would restart talks with Cuba ahead of the United States' attendance at a meeting of the Organization of American States (OAS), where Cuba may successfully rejoin the bloc.
The State Department said Friday it had proposed restarting the talks to "reaffirm both sides' commitment to safe, legal and orderly migration, to review trends in illegal Cuban migration to the United States and to improve operational relations with Cuba on migration issues."
The olive branch is the second move this year by the Obama administration to ease the hard feelings between the United States government and that of the communist government in Cuba. In April, Obama lifted restrictions on travel to Cuba by Americans with families there. He also lifted the restrictions on the amount of money Americans can send their Cuban relatives.
The Cuban government has given no official response to the offer from the Obama administration, but the Republican bloc of Cuban-American Congressmen and women immediately denounced the move. Both Diaz-Balart brothers and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said the move was, "another unilateral concession by the Obama administration to the dictatorship."
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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