CARTAGENA, Colombia — When it comes to President Obama, there’s always hope — even for Cuba.
The commander-in-chief yesterday said he was “hopeful” the Caribbean island would begin “loosening up” its communist ways in the years ahead.
The country’s exclusion from the Summit of the Americas over the weekend was a divisive issue — as was Obama’s refusal to drop the war on drugs and Argentina’s claim to the Falkland Islands — and caused the meeting to end without a joint declaration.
“There is no declaration because there is no consensus,” said Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos at the summit’s closing news conference.
While many Western Hemisphere leaders wanted to allow Cuba to attend the next conference, scheduled for 2015 in Panama, the United States and Canada staunchly opposed.
Obama, however, did express a willingness to explore new solutions to the Cuba problem.
Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa boycotted the summit over the Cuba issue, and Nicaragua’s leftist president, Daniel Ortega, was a no-show, although he offered no explanation for his absence. Venezuela’s cancer-stricken President Hugo Chavez also did not attend.
The United States and Canada again teamed up to refute Argentina’s claims to the British-held Falkland Islands.
The drug war also took center stage, with South American leaders criticizing Obama for continuing the bloody fight against the narcotics trade.
Santos urged a reconsideration of tactics, noting that Colombia’s extradition of alleged drug traffickers for trial to the United States has caused criminals to flee to Central America and Mexico, where law enforcement is weaker.
“I don’t mind a debate around issues like decriminalization,” Obama said in a pre-summit interview with Univisión. “I personally don’t agree that that’s a solution to the problem.”