News Americas, HAVANA, Cuba, Weds. April 22, 2015: New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and members of the NYS Trade Mission yesterday returned to the US after a historic 25-hour trade mission to Cuba.
Cuomo said he believes his visit, the first by a sitting U.S. governor to the island since Obama’s December announcement, will increase the pressure on Congress to ease the U.S. embargo.
Cuomo’s visit included a round-table conversation between the New York business executives who visited as part of his delegation and their Cuban counterparts. On Tuesday, the governor traveled to the Port of Mariel for a tour and briefing of the Port’s facilities, history and economic significance.
Following the tour, he returned to Havana to meet with First Vice President Miguel Díaz-Canel and then delivered remarks and held a brief media availability at the Jose Marti Airport before returning to New York.
“Engagement and full relationships is the best way to have a dialogue on the issues that we agree with and on the issues that we disagree about,” Cuomo said Monday while praising President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raúl Castro for seeking to normalize diplomatic relations between the two countries.
“I think this is now a question of building momentum,” Cuomo said. “And if the conversation is isolated in Washington and is a political conversation between President Obama and the Congress…that’s going to be the politics, the gridlock that we have seen from Washington all too often.”
Cuomo did not meet with Cuban President Raúl Castro.
