REACHING OUT TO THE CUBAN PEOPLE

Office of the Press Secretary

Today, President Obama has directed the Secretaries of State,
Treasury, and Homeland Security to take a series of steps to continue
efforts to reach out to the Cuban people in support of their desire to
freely determine their country’s future.

The President has directed that changes be made to regulations and
policies governing: (1) purposeful travel; (2) non-family remittances;
and (3) U.S. airports supporting licensed charter flights to and from
Cuba. These measures will increase people-to-people contact; support
civil society in Cuba; enhance the free flow of information to, from,
and among the Cuban people; and help promote their independence from
Cuban authorities.

The President believes these actions, combined with the continuation
of the embargo, are important steps in reaching the widely shared goal
of a Cuba that respects the basic rights of all its citizens. These
steps build upon the President’s April 2009 actions to help reunite
divided Cuban families; to facilitate greater telecommunications with
the Cuban people; and to increase humanitarian flows to Cuba.

The directed changes described below will be enacted through
modifications to existing Cuban Assets Control and Customs and Border
Protection regulations and policies and will take effect upon
publication of modified regulations in the Federal Register within 2
weeks.

Purposeful Travel. To enhance contact with the Cuban people and
support civil society through purposeful travel, including religious,
cultural, and educational travel, the President has directed that
regulations and policies governing purposeful travel be modified to:

· Allow religious organizations to sponsor religious travel to Cuba
under a general license.

· Facilitate educational exchanges by: allowing accredited
institutions of higher education to sponsor travel to Cuba for course
work for academic credit under a general license; allowing students to
participate through academic institutions other than their own; and
facilitating instructor support to include support from adjunct and
part-time staff.

· Restore specific licensing of educational exchanges not involving
academic study pursuant to a degree program under the auspices of an
organization that sponsors and organizes people-to-people programs.

· Modify requirements for licensing academic exchanges to require that
the proposed course of study be accepted for academic credit toward
their undergraduate or graduate degree (rather than regulating the
length of the academic exchange in Cuba).

· Allow specifically licensed academic institutions to sponsor or
cosponsor academic seminars, conferences, and workshops related to
Cuba and allow faculty, staff, and students to attend.

· Allow specific licensing to organize or conduct non-academic clinics
and workshops in Cuba for the Cuban people.

· Allow specific licensing for a greater scope of journalistic activities.

Remittances. To help expand the economic independence of the Cuban
people and to support a more vibrant Cuban civil society, the
President has directed the regulations governing non-family
remittances be modified to:

· Restore a general license category for any U.S. person to send
remittances (up to $500 per quarter) to non-family members in Cuba to
support private economic activity, among other purposes, subject to
the limitation that they cannot be provided to senior Cuban government
officials or senior members of the Cuban Communist Party.

· Create a general license for remittances to religious institutions
in Cuba in support of religious activities.

No change will be made to the general license for family remittances.

U.S. Airports. To better serve those who seek to visit family in Cuba
and engage in other licensed purposeful travel, the President has
directed that regulations governing the eligibility of U.S. airports
to serve as points of embarkation and return for licensed flights to
Cuba be modified to:

· Allow all U.S. international airports to apply to provide services
to licensed charters, provided such airports have adequate customs and
immigration capabilities and a licensed travel service provider has
expressed an interest in providing service to and from Cuba from that
airport.

The modifications will not change the designation of airports in Cuba
that are eligible to send or receive licensed charter flights to and
from the United States.