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US to seek end to travel restrictions, establish embassy in Cuba - official


    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States will try to convince Cuba to lift travel restrictions and upgrade its interest section to an embassy during historic talks in Havana this week, a senior State Department official said on Monday.

    "We are looking forward to the Cubans lifting travel restrictions, to trying to lift the caps on the number of our diplomat personnel, to try to gain unimpeded shipments for our mission and to the free access to our mission by Cubans," the official told a conference call.

    The talks aimed at normalization relations with Cuba will be led by Roberta Jacobson, the State Department's top diplomat for Latin America, the first visit by a senior American diplomat in more than three decades.

    The official, however, said it was hard to know exactly what would come out of the talks on Jan. 21-23. "It is hard to know exactly what will come out of this first conversation," the official said. "We are not oblivious to the weight of history."

    (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)