Supporters of closer Cuba ties see a chance with Obama’s win

Bernardo Benes is plotting to reprise his role as broker of the one humanitarian breakthrough in U.S.-Cuban relations since Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution. Benes, who negotiated the 1978 release of 3,600 political prisoners and the right for Cuban exiles to visit family on the communist island, plans a freelance mission to his homeland to sound out President Raul Castro on what the Havana regime wants from President-elect Barack Obama. ‘I want to be a loose cannon,’ said the 73-year-old retired banker. ‘I know Raul Castro will meet with me. We were teammates on the soccer team at the University of Havana. They trust me. My only hesitation is that they might think I have a message from Obama and they would be disappointed that I don’t.’ Benes, like other supporters of improved relations with Cuba, sees in Obama’s victory an opportunity to ease one of the most intractable relationships of the last half-century.