HAVANA // US secretary of state John Kerry called for “genuine democracy” in Cuba on Friday as the American flag was raised over a US embassy in Havana for the first time in 54 years.
Putting a symbolic capstone on the United States’ historic rapprochement with Cuba, Mr Kerry gave the cue to hoist the Stars and Stripes over the glass-and-concrete building on the Havana waterfront.
Three retired Marines who lowered the flag on the day that Washington severed ties with Havana at the height of the Cold War, were on hand to give the new flag to the Marine guard now charged with security at the embassy.
A historic rapprochement between the US and Cuba was announced on December 17 by American president Barack Obama and his Cuban counterpart, Raúl Castro, paving the way for the two countries to reopen their embassies on July 20.
Mr Kerry, the first secretary of state to visit Cuba since 1945, said the shift in US policy did not mean that Washington would stop pressing for change on the communist island.
“The leaders in Havana and the Cuban people should also know that the United States will always remain a champion of democratic principles and reforms,” he said.
“We remain convinced the people of Cuba would be best served by a genuine democracy where people are free to choose their leaders with commitment, economic and social justice.”
The thawing in the Cold War conflict has been criticised by Mr Obama’s conservative opponents.
Mr Kerry’s visit drew barbed comments from leading Republicans, including 2016 presidential contenders Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush.
Mr Rubio, a Cuban-American senator from Florida, slammed the Obama administration for the absence of Cuban dissidents from the flag-raising ceremony.
“All the people in Cuba fighting for democracy, when they protest, they are rounded up, arrested and beaten. None of them were invited to this event,” he told Fox News.
Cuban dissidents have expressed concern that the thaw between the two governments will leave them out in the cold.
But Mr Kerry insisted that the breakdown in ties and the US trade embargo on the island had failed to force Cuba to reform – and that a new path must be sought.
* Agence France-Presse
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