Cuba issues bristling editorial ahead of Obama visit

Cuba issues bristling editorial ahead of Obama visit
By Marc Frank

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba said it would welcome President Barack Obama to
Havana later this month, but the Communist government had no intention
of changing its policies in exchange for normal relations with the
United States.

In a long editorial on Wednesday in Communist Party newspaper Granma and
other official media, Cuba demanded Washington cease meddling in its
internal affairs and said Obama could do more to change U.S. policy.

The White House brushed off the piece and defended the president's trip
next month as an opportunity to engage both with Cuba's government and
its citizens.

Obama will visit on March 20-22, 15 months after he and Cuban President
Raul Castro agreed to end more than five decades of Cold War-era animosity.

They have restored diplomatic ties, and Obama has relaxed a trade
sanctions and travel restrictions, leading Republican opponents and some
of the president's fellow Democrats to question whether Washington was
offering too much without reciprocation from Havana.

But the editorial made it clear that Cuba still has a long list of
grievances with the United States, starting with the comprehensive trade
embargo. Obama wants to rescind the embargo but Republican leadership in
Congress has blocked the move.

Cuba also objected to U.S. support for its political dissidents, whom
some Americans consider champions of human rights but whom the Cuban
government views as an unrepresentative minority funded by U.S. interests.

"(The United States) should abandon the pretense of fabricating an
internal political opposition, paid for with money from U.S. taxpayers,"
the nearly 3,000-word editorial said.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters that Obama's "long
agenda includes visiting with political opposition of the Cuban
government and standing up for, in a very tangible way, the universal
human rights of the Cuban people."

Obama visit will be only the second by a U.S. president and the first
since the 1959 revolution led by Fidel Castro that overthrew a
pro-American government.

The editorial said Cuba no one should assume Cuba had to "renounce any
of its principles or cede the slightest bit in its defense" to do so.

The two countries have also negotiated greater cooperation on law
enforcement and environmental issues and agreed to resume scheduled
commercial flights and postal services. Obama has removed Cuba from a
list of state sponsors of terrorism.

The editorial acknowledged Obama had taken positive steps but criticized
their "limited nature and the existence of other regulations and
intimidation caused by the overall blockade that has been in force for
more than 50 years."

(Reporting by Marc Frank; Additional reporting by Timothy Gardner and
Susan Heavey in Washington; Editing by Daniel Trotta, Lisa Von Ahn and
Alistair Bell)

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