European Commissioner Satisfied with Meeting with Raul Castro

“We spent two hours analyzing European Union-Cuba relations. It was an open, frank and constructive dialogue,” said the visitor minutes before leaving the Caribbean nation on Thursday.

The Belgian official told reporters at the Jose Marti International Airport in Havana that they also reviewed Cuba’s relations with the 27 European nations.

De Gucht said he hoped for a change in “this political situation in which there is the European Union on one side and Cuba on the other so that we have relations of the same kind that we have with the rest of the world.”

The EU high-ranking official also expressed his rejection of the US economic blockade of the island because, he said, “it is not useful at all for international relations.”

De Gucht arrived in Havana last Saturday for a visit at the invitation of the Cuban
Foreign Minister, Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla. During his stay in Cuba, he inaugurated the stand of the European Union at the 27th Havana’s International Fair (FIHAV 2009) that is underway at the EXPOCUBA exhibit center. He also visited places of historic and scientific interest.

De Gucht recently took the post as European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Assistance from the hands of his compatriot Louis Michel, who visited Cuba in March 2008.