CIA Director lands in Cuba for high-level visit

已複製連結

CIA Director John Ratcliffe meets with Cuban officials including Raul Castro's grandson during a high-level visit to the island Thursday, Cuban and US officials says. 

Ratcliffe met with Raul Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, Interior Minister Lazarlaez Casas of Cuban intelligence services to discuss intelligence cooperation, economic stability and security issues. 

A CIA official confirms the meetings to the AP.

Ratcliffe was there "to personally deliver President Donald Trump's message that the United States is prepared to seriously engage on economic and security issues, but only if Cuba makes fundamental changes,'' the CIA official said.

An official statement from Cuba's government noted that Thursday's meeting "took place ... against a backdrop of complex bilateral relations." 

Rodriguez Castro previously secretly met with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the sidelines of a Caribbean Community summit in St. Kitts in February. While he's never occupied a government post, he served as his grandfather's bodyguard and later as head of Cuba's equivalent of the Secret Service. 

US and Cuban officials also met earlier this year in Cuba. 

The ongoing meetings between the nations' officials mark the first US government flights to land in Cuba other than at the US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay since 2016. 

Thursday's meeting comes weeks after the Cuban government confirmed it had recently met with US officials on the island as tensions between the two sides remain high over the US energy blockade of the Caribbean country.

This as Cuba's power grid has collapsed and energy to its eastern provinces has been cut. 

The US blockade of fuel to the island has heightened its economic woes, with reduced work hours and food spoilage as refrigerators stop working.