Reuters, Havana
U.S. President Barack Obama is welcome to visit Cuba but not to meddle in its internal affairs, a senior foreign ministry official said on Wednesday on the eve of the first anniversary of the two countries’ historic rapprochement.
“The day that the president of the United States decides to visit Cuba, he will be welcome,” Josefina Vidal, director of U.S. affairs in the Cuban foreign ministry, told reporters.
Pentagon says Carter used personal email
AP, Washington
The Pentagon acknowledged Wednesday that Defense Secretary Ash Carter used a personal email account to do some of his government business during his first months on the job.
Carter’s press secretary, Peter Cook, released a statement saying Carter believes his use of personal email for work-related business was a mistake. Cook declined to say whether it was a violation of Pentagon email policies. Cook said Carter stopped the practice, but Cook did not say when.
Sudanese to be deported by Jordan
AP, Amman
Hundreds of Sudanese asylum seekers slated for deportation have spent a night near Jordan’s international airport, as the U.N. refugee agency urged Jordan not to send them back to Sudan.
Agency spokeswoman Aoife McDonnell said Thursday that “we are gravely concerned about these people.” She says the potential deportations “go against the principle of no forced return” enshrined in international law.
US envoy defends Okinawa base plan
AP, Tokyo
U.S. Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy defended on Thursday a controversial proposal to relocate a U.S. Marine Corps base on Okinawa in southern Japan as the best of many options considered.
In a rare news conference in Tokyo, she also expressed confidence that the U.S. Congress would ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact with 12 nations, including Japan and the United States.
