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MIAMI, July 13 (Reuters) - A Miami-based charter company said on Monday it
would launch the first non-stop passenger flight from Miami to Cuba in two years
this week.
Staff at ABC Charters said a chartered United Airlines aircraft was
scheduled to leave Miami International Airport at 9:00 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT) on
Wednesday for the first one-hour flight, carrying about 200 passengers.
Cuba's government said on Thursday it had authorised landing rights for ABC
to run direct flights between the United States and Cuba.
The company received permission in June from the U.S.
Treasury Department to resume direct flights to Havana. But it had been
waiting for landing rights from the Cuban government.
The U.S. government said in March it was lifting a two-year-old ban on
direct charter passenger flights between the U.S. and communist-ruled Cuba.
President Bill Clinton barred direct flights in 1996 after Cuban fighters
shot down two small U.S. planes, killing four members of Brothers to the Rescue,
a Cuban exile group that had been best known for flying over the Florida Straits
looking for Cubans trying to reach Florida on small rafts.
Washington's 36-year economic embargo on Cuba bars most Americans from
travelling to the island as they are not allowed to spend money in Cuba. Those
exempted, and so able to fly on the direct flights, include Cuban Americans
making humanitarian visits, academics on research projects and journalists.
16:01 07-13-98
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