Alan Gross, an U.S. citizen who was imprisoned in Cuba for five years, said he supports President Obama’s decision to visit the island nation.
“His interest in going to Cuba is a very courageous thing to do, as was the decision to bring me home,” the former contractor for the U.S. Agency for International Development told Bloomberg in an interview published Friday.
“If we’re the leading country in the world, then we should lead by example” and stop “punishing a country for something that happened in the past that they’re trying to climb out of,” said Gross, who campaigned for Obama in 2008. “People just don’t understand: Life in Cuba for 11.3 million people is horrendous. They are just as much prisoners as I was.”
Gross, who was released in December 2014, also slammed Cuban leaders Fidel and Raul Castro.
“The Castros are totally irrelevant to Cuba’s future,” he said. “From a practical standpoint, they’ll be gone within a matter of a few years. Their legacy will be very difficult for Cuba to escape from. But Cuba will escape from that, and we need to get out of the way.”
Gross was also critical of U.S. lawmakers who oppose the president’s decision to normalize diplomatic ties with Havana.
Those lawmakers “are irrational when it comes to Cuba,” Gross said. “Some of them can say I’m suffering from Stockholm syndrome, but I dare them to say it to my face. As someone who’s worked in international economic development for the last 35 years, I think that improving relations with Cuba is in our best interests.”
Obama, who announced late 2014 that the U.S. and Cuba were restoring ties after they were severed during the Cold War, will be visit the communist nation March 20.
