Attention U.S. travelers going abroad: You now can bring home all the Cuban rum and cigars you want.
The Obama administration announced Friday a new round of executive actions designed to increase trade and travel with the communist island. And this is the one many Americans have been waiting for — no more restrictions on the island’s famed rum and cigars.
Under the new rules, which go into effect Monday, travelers can purchase unlimited quantities of Cuban rum and cigars in any country where they are sold so long as they are for personal consumption. Sorry American couch potatoes: You can’t order Cuban rum and cigars online and have them shipped to your home.
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Are they really that much better than other cigars?
As Florida prepares for Hurricane Matthew’s arrival, cities in Cuba and Haiti are already coping with the aftermath of what Reuters called the “fiercest Caribbean storm in nearly a decade.”
The hurricane made landfall in Les Anglais, Haiti, early Tuesday morning, bringing winds near 145 miles per hour and up to 40 inches of rain in certain parts of the country. These conditions resulted in the deaths of at least 69 people, according to Reuters.
“We’ve already seen deaths. People who were out at sea. There are people who are missing. They are people who didn’t respect the alerts. They’ve lost their lives,” Interim Haitian President Jocelerme Privert said at a press conference reported on by CNN.
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A woman surrounded by the remains of her home in Baracoa, CubaSource: Ramon Espinosa/AP
Hurricane Matthew, the fiercest Caribbean storm in almost a decade, hit Cuba and Haiti with 140 mile-per-hour (230 kph) winds on Tuesday, pummeling towns, farmland and resorts, and forcing hundreds of thousands of people to take cover.
Dubbed by the U.N. the worst humanitarian crisis to hit Haiti since a devastating 2010 earthquake, the Category Four hurricane unleashed torrential rain on the island of Hispaniola that Haiti shares with Dominican Republic.
As it barreled towards the United States, the eye of the storm had reached the coast of eastern Cuba by Tuesday evening, the Miami-based National Hurricane Center (NHC) said.
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Alexandre Meneghini / Reuters
A wave splashes on the beach at Siboney ahead of the arrival of Hurricane Matthew, Cuba, October 4, 2016.
Just days after President Obama’s historic trip to Cuba, Fidel Castro ripped the warming of relations between his nation and the U.S., angrily stating that “we don’t need the empire to give us any presents.”
In a 1,500-word bristling letter titled “Brother Obama,” published Monday in Cuban state media, Castro, who did not meet with Obama during the visit, recounted decades of U.S. aggression against his country and told Obama to stay out of Cuba’s affairs.
President Barack Obama arrived to small but cheering crowds on Sunday at the start of a historic visit to Cuba that opened a new chapter in U.S. engagement with the island’s Communist government after decades of hostility between the former Cold War foes.
The three-day trip, the first by a U.S. president to Cuba in 88 years, is the culmination of a diplomatic opening announced by Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro in December 2014, ending an estrangement that began when the Cuban revolution ousted a pro-American government in 1959.
“It’s a historic opportunity to engage directly with the Cuban people,” Obama told staff at the newly reopened U.S. Embassy who were gathered at a hotel, his first stop after arriving in the afternoon.
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Watched over by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, U.S. Marines raised the American flag at the embassy in Cuba for the first time in 54 years on Friday, symbolically ushering in an era of renewed diplomatic relations between the two Cold War-era foes.
Three retired Marines who last lowered the flag in 1961 participated in the ceremony, handing a new flag to the Marine Color Guard, which raised it on the grounds outside the embassy building on the Havana seafront.
Kerry, the first U.S. secretary of state to visit Cuba in 70 years, told the ceremony it was obvious that “the road of mutual isolation and estrangement that the United States and Cuba have been traveling is not the right one and that the time has come for us to move in a more promising direction.”
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
President Barack Obama announced Wednesday that the U.S. and Cuba have struck a deal to open embassies in each other’s capitals and re-establish diplomatic relations for the first time in half a century.
“The progress we make today is another demonstration we don’t have to be imprisoned by the past,” Obama said.
Obama emphasized that the U.S. and Cuba have some shared interests, such as strong anti-terrorism policies and disaster response. But he acknowledged that the two nations still have “very serious differences” on issues like free speech.
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U.S., Cuba Will Reopen Embassies in Havana and Washington Within Weeks
President Barack Obama on Saturday declared his refusal to refight the Cold War battles while Cuban President Raul Castro rallied to his defense, absolving Obama of fault for the U.S. blockade in a stunning reversal of more than 50 years of animosity between the United States and Cuba.
“In my opinion, President Obama is an honest man,” Castro said – a remarkable vote of confidence from the Cuban leader, who praised Obama’s life and his “humble background.”
Turning the page on the longstanding U.S. policy of isolation, Castro and Obama were expected to meet later Saturday on the sidelines of the Summit of the Americas – the first substantial meeting between a U.S. and Cuban president in more than five decades.
Take a look at these old cars in Cuba that are still on the road.
No apparent rust with all the salt water too…..
This is the first thing you notice when you get off the plane in Havana. It is surprising how well maintained these old cars are since Cubans have not been able to get any kind of parts for them from the USA. A step back in time for sure.
CARACAS, Venezuela — President Hugo Chavez is recovering favorably despite suffering complications during cancer surgery in Cuba, his vice president said Thursday amid uncertainty over the Venezuelan leader’s health crisis and the country’s political future.
A day after officials painted a grim picture of Chavez’s health, Vice President Nicolas Maduro announced at a political rally that his condition “has evolved from stable to favorable, which supports maintaining the diagnosis of an increasing recuperation.”
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Are they really that much better than other cigars?
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
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James' World 2 