Cuba

Our organization was pleased to read about plans to begin charter flights from BWI to Cuba in March ("Hola, Cuba! Flights from BWI to Cuba to start next year," Nov. 4). It's about time. The ban on U.S. citizens traveling to Cuba has been in place for over 50 years. It is part of the economic embargo the U.S. instituted to try to starve Cuba into complying with our vision of what Cuba's form of government should be. If it was up to people like the restaurant owner from Towson quoted in the article, that policy would stay in place another 50 years.

I was elated to read your article about the new charter flights to Cuba ("BWI flights to Cuba to start in March," Nov. 5). I left Cuba in 1997 which I was 9, which officially makes me a "Castro's daughter" - the term Cuban-Americans use to describe those who left long after the revolution. That being said, I don't share the views of those who lament any thawing of relations between the United States and Cuba. For me, the Cold War is over, the Eastern bloc and the Soviets are gone, and now it's time to focus on our little island and its wonderful people who have been isolated much too long.

A Tampa-based company plans to begin offering flights next spring from BWI-Marshall Airport to Cuba, where travel has been restricted since 1961, shortly after Fidel Castro took power and nationalized U.S.-owned businesses. But visitors shouldn't count on buying tickets solely to explore the island's beaches. "You cannot go to Cuba for what they call tourism," said William Hauf, president of Island Travel & Tours Ltd., which announced plans for the flights Friday. The Island Travel trips are considered charters, though they will operate at fixed times on Wednesdays much like scheduled airline flights.

If you have the hankering for a good cigar, you will be able to jump on a charter flight from BWI to Cuba beginning in March and buy a box there. Island Travel & Tours Ltd.  will be operating the weekly service that departs mid-afternoons starting March 21. William Hauf, president of Island Travel, said in a statement:  “These flights will greatly expand opportunities for increased engagement between the two countries and facilitate legal travel to Cuba for business leaders, government officials, diplomats, academics, cultural groups, agricultural interests, performing arts groups, and Cuban-Americans wishing to reconnect with their families and their country.” Baltimore is entering an elite travel niche.

Please pass on to letter writer Umar Farooq ("Occupy Baltimore: There's a reason The Sun can't grasp what our movement is about," Oct. 8) that most of us prefer the optimism and opportunity of capitalism to the pessimism and depression of socialism. He should look at Cuba as an example of socialism - and then ask himself why the U.S. gets so many immigrants from that country, while almost no one from here wants to live there. Lyle Rescott, Marriottsville

Cuba's Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Maryland contractor Alan Gross to be released from a 15-year prison sentence for alleged spying. The court claimed that Gross, of Potomac, who was arrested in December 2009 after distributing computer equipment on the communist island, was part of a U.S. campaign "aimed at destabilizing the country," according to a statement published Friday on the Cuban government-run website Cubadebate. The U.S. State Department deplored the ruling and called on President Raul Castro's government to release Gross immediately.

Baltimore is fortunate to be one of eight new cities added to the list of those airports able to serve travelers to Cuba ("BWI eligible to provide charter flights to Cuba," March 9). Under current rules, Cuban-Americans, religious delegations, academics, researchers and business people seeking to sell agriculture products can travel to Cuba, and they will now be able to use Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport for their departures. Baltimore's status would be threatened, however, by an amendment written by Florida's Senator Marco Rubio and New Jersey's Senator Bob Menendez to prevent all new airports from serving the Cuban market because these senators oppose engagement between the United States and Cuba.

Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport has been authorized to become one of the United States' gateways to Cuba under a new policy allowing charter flights to the island nation. BWI announced Tuesday that it had been selected as one of eight airports to receive permission to join Miami, New York and Los Angeles in providing the charter flights. The service is being allowed after the Obama administration decided to relax the U.S. ban on direct flights to the communist country.

It's been said that when elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. No case illustrates this suffering more than that of Alan Gross, a Maryland resident and USAID subcontractor who was working to connect the Cuban Jewish community to the Internet and was detained by Cuban authorities one year ago. Campaigning for his release these many months, his wife, Judy Gross, fears that her husband has become a "pawn" in the half-century Cold War between...

Last month, I received an e-mail from a Towson office worker who told me about his pleasurable first visit to Havana Road Cafe , and he told me how much he and his friend loved the pulled-pork sandwich and the classic Cubano, with slow-roasted pork, ham, Swiss and pickles, He was hoping Havana Road could get some attention, and he acknowledged that he was acting out of self-interest: "I want to be sure they get plenty of business so they stay in...