Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel issued a new challenge to the United States on Wednesday amid ongoing negotiations between the two countries, which are marked by escalating tensions. The president, who also heads the long-established Communist Party of Cuba, asserted that dialogue with Washington can only proceed if the northern power respects Cuban conditions. “There is no negotiation,” if the United States does not agree to discussions on Cuban terms, Díaz-Canel declared in a televised address recorded at Havana’s iconic Palace of the Revolution.

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The United States government has issued an ultimatum demanding that Cuba release artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara and rapper Maykel Osorbo, who have been imprisoned on the island for five years. In a secret meeting on April 10 in Havana, as part of negotiations that both governments have confirmed but about which very little is officially known, State Department officials gave Cuban authorities a two-week deadline for the release of the high-profile artists “as a gesture of good faith,” as well as the release of the more than 1,000 other political prisoners held by the regime.

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