Candidates call for democracy in Cuba

By Andy Sullivan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama suggested on Tuesday they might lift a trade embargo on Cuba if retiring leader Fidel Castro's successor moves toward democracy.

Republican front-runner John McCain, meanwhile, said the United States must keep the sanctions on Cuba's communist government in place until it allows free elections and releases political prisoners.

"I fear that anything short of that, that any assistance that came in earlier than that, might serve to prop up a new regime," the Arizona senator said at a rally in Milwaukee.

Castro, 81, said he would not return as head of state 49 years after he seized power in an armed revolution. He has not appeared in public since undergoing stomach surgery and handing power temporarily to his brother Raul in July 2006.

President George W. Bush has tightened a decades-long trade embargo and has rejected easing sanctions without a transition to democracy.

Several experts said the change of leadership will provide a chance for the United States to reassess its Cuba policy, though they do not expect any changes while Bush remains in office.

McCain has generally echoed the Bush administration's approach to Cuba, but Clinton and Obama have differed in some respects.

Clinton, a New York senator, voted to ease travel restrictions to Cuba in 2003 and 2005 but has supported keeping other aspects of the embargo in place.