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Sen. Rubio fires back on Cuba: Obama 'worst negotiator'

18 December 2014 20:11 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. A top Republican senator has threatened President Barack Obama with extreme reactions from his party in Congress over the recent announcement of renewed relations with Cuba, APA reports quoting Press TV.

In a press conference on Wednesday, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio vowed that if Obama moves on with his plan to restore diplomatic relations with the Latin American country, no money will be allocated to his Cuba policy, no ambassador will be confirmed and the half-century trade embargo will never be lifted.

"This entire policy shift announced today is based on an illusion, based on a lie,” Rubio, who is the son of Cuban immigrants, told reporters on Capitol Hill. "The White House has conceded everything and gained little."

"I’m committed to doing everything I can to unravel as many of these changes as possible," he added.

Rubio made the comments hours after Obama made the historic announcement of starting talks with Cuba to normalize full diplomatic relations, marking the most significant shift in US foreign policy towards the country in over 50 years.

"I do not believe we can continue doing the same thing for over five decades and expect a different result," Obama said of the embargo on Cuba, adding that Washington intends to open an embassy in Havana. "Isolation has not worked."

Sen. Rubio will have some power at his disposal in the new Republican-led Senate which comes into session on January 6.

The Florida senator will be the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee's subcommittee on the Western hemisphere, which has oversight of US dealings in the region.

"This Congress is not going to lift the embargo," Rubio declared at the end of his news conference, calling Obama’s decision "not just naive, but willfully ignorant of the way the world truly works."

"This president is the single worst negotiator we have had in the White House in my lifetime," the senator said.

House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican from Ohio, also followed Rubio’s stance, saying the decision "emboldens all state sponsors of terrorism."

"Relations with the Castro regime should not be revisited, let alone normalized, until the Cuban people enjoy freedom -– and not one second sooner," Boehner said in a statement.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, a staunch critic of the administration on foreign policy, also threatened to do everything in his power to block funding for setting up an embassy in Cuba.

Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake, however, praised Obama’s decision and said, "I think people will come around to it, and let's move forward."

Just after Obama’s remarks, Alan Gross, an American who had been held in a Cuban prison for five years, was released. Gross' release was earlier negotiated in exchange for the freeing of three Cubans who had been jailed in the US for spying.

Cuba and the United States have not had diplomatic relations since 1961. They became ideological foes soon after the 1959 revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power.