Amnesty International yesterday urged US President Barack Obama to drop the “immoral” US embargo against Cuba, warning that millions were being denied proper healthcare and medicine.
The London-based rights organization issued the appeal days before an annual deadline for the US president to renew its decades-long embargo against Cuba under the Trading with the Enemy Act.
“This is the perfect opportunity for President Obama to distance himself from the failed policies of the past and to send a strong message to the US Congress on the need to end the embargo,” Amnesty International secretary general Irene Khan said.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The group, which published a report yesterday on the economic impact of Washington’s embargo, said Cuba was unable to import medicines, medical equipment and related technologies from the US or any US company based abroad.
“The US embargo against Cuba is immoral and should be lifted. It’s preventing millions of Cubans from benefiting from vital medicines and medical equipment essential for their health,” Khan said.
“Products patented in the USA or containing more than 20 percent US-manufactured parts or components cannot be exported to Cuba, even if they are produced in third countries,” she said.
The US requires that Cuba make progress on democracy before ending the economic embargo on its neighbor, which has been in place since 1962.
Obama has said he would be prepared to make changes in US-Cuban relations and so far has allowed Cuban-Americans to travel home more often and ended limits on the amount of money they send home.
Chinese authorities said they began live-fire exercises in the Gulf of Tonkin on Monday, only days after Vietnam announced a new line marking what it considers its territory in the body of water between the nations. The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration said the exercises would be focused on the Beibu Gulf area, closer to the Chinese side of the Gulf of Tonkin, and would run until tomorrow evening. It gave no further details, but the drills follow an announcement last week by Vietnam establishing a baseline used to calculate the width of its territorial waters in the Gulf of Tonkin. State-run Vietnam News
When Shanghai-based designer Guo Qingshan posted a vacation photo on Valentine’s Day and captioned it “Puppy Mountain,” it became a sensation in China and even created a tourist destination. Guo had gone on a hike while visiting his hometown of Yichang in central China’s Hubei Province late last month. When reviewing the photographs, he saw something he had not noticed before: A mountain shaped like a dog’s head rested on the ground next to the Yangtze River, its snout perched at the water’s edge. “It was so magical and cute. I was so excited and happy when I discovered it,” Guo said.
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
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