Democratic front-runner Barack Obama sought to toughen his position on meeting such US foes as Cuban President Raul Castro, outlining his conditions in a delicate pitch aimed at winning over an important voting bloc in the November presidential elections.
Obama's speech on Friday to the Cuban American National Foundation — a foray into delicate political waters — sought to counter stepped-up criticism from rival John McCain. Obama, with an insurmountable lead over rival Hillary Rodham Clinton, is increasingly appearing as the Republican’s challenger for the White House.
On Friday, Obama picked up five more delegates, including one who switched allegiance from Clinton. With an almost 200-delegate lead over the former first lady, Obama is just 61 delegates short of the 2,026 needed to clinch the nomination.
McCain also took on a politically sensitive subject, releasing medical records aimed at easing concern that at 71 years old, he is too old to be president. The records showed that the three-time melanoma survivor appears cancer-free, has a strong heart and is in general good health.
Obama’s speech to the Cuban group came three days after McCain ridiculed him in Florida for saying he would meet Castro. Obama had said in a debate last year that he would meet without preconditions with the leaders of Cuba, Iran and Venezuela — all US adversaries.
The first-term Illinois senator said McCain has been “going around the country talking about how much I want to meet with Raul Castro as if I’m looking for a social gathering. That’s never what I’ve said and John McCain knows it.”
Obama said he would meet Castro only at a time and place of his choosing and when there is “an opportunity to advance the interests of the United States and to advance the cause of freedom for the Cuban people.”
He said he would maintain the existing trade embargo to use as leverage for winning democratic change in Cuba. But he said he would lift restrictions on family travel and remittances to the island. The audience of Cuban-Americans applauded his remarks.
Obama was addressing a group known for its tough line against former Cuban president Fidel Castro. But in recent years, frustrated with the lack of change on the island, it has entertained some more moderate views.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
CARGO PLANE VECTOR: Officials said they believe that attacks involving incendiary devices on planes was the work of Russia’s military intelligence agency the GRU Western security officials suspect Russian intelligence was behind a plot to put incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes headed to North America, including one that caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another that ignited in a warehouse in England. Poland last month said that it had arrested four people suspected to be linked to a foreign intelligence operation that carried out sabotage and was searching for two others. Lithuania’s prosecutor general Nida Grunskiene on Tuesday said that there were an unspecified number of people detained in several countries, offering no elaboration. The events come as Western officials say
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
RSS