The U.S. consul general in Vancouver, Phillip Chicola, says that an April 13 announcement by President Barack Obama on Cuba does not mean that all Americans can travel as tourists to the Caribbean island nation.

Chicola, who was born in Cuba, told the Georgia Straight in an interview that Obama’s decision to lift all restrictions on family visits to Cuba is “not very dissimilar” to the situation that existed in the 1990s when Bill Clinton and George Bush Sr. occupied the White House.

He noted that the former president George W. Bush tightened the rules within a year or two of taking office in 2001.

Obama has also removed restrictions on remittances to family members in Cuba. However, he didn’t lift trade restrictions apart from expanding the scope of humanitarian donations that can be made.

“Remittances and visits have been on now for 30-odd years to a greater or lesser degree,” Chicola said. “What President Obama has done here is make it much easier to visit…which I think is very sensible.”

The U.S. consul general said he was 12 or 13 years old when his family left Cuba in 1961—the year before the Cuban Missile Crisis that nearly led to nuclear war between the U.S. and the former Soviet Union.

“We came out on a Pan American Airlines plane after waiting in line to be able to get out for five or six months,” Chicola said.

He joined the U.S. State Department in 1979, and has worked in Brazil, El Salvador, Colombia, Chile, Guatemala, and Croatia. He took up his position in Vancouver last August.

When asked why it’s so problematic for Americans to visit Cuba, Chicola said that it’s necessary to remember the history of the two countries’ relationship.

“Restrictions started in the ’60s when, in fact, it was physically dangerous for anyone in the United States to visit Cuba,” he said. “I mean, the chances of being put in jail were pretty significant, especially for Cuban-Americans or for Cubans living in the United States at the time. It was also a time when the trade embargo was created by executive order.”

In addition, there was a botched U.S. invasion in the Bay of Pigs, which soured the relationship. However, Chicola said that in recent years, there has been pressure exerted by U.S. farmers to sell products to Cuba on a cash-and-carry basis.

In addition, he said the perspective of many Cuban-Americans is changing.

Some with relatives want to travel more frequently to Cuba whereas others oppose any contact because they believe it will help support the Communist government.

“Increasingly, though, as the older crowd passes on or moderates their their views, I think there has been sort of a building consensus—certainly over visits and remittances."

Chicola said he last visited Cuba in 1987, and he still exchanges the occasional letter or e-mail with a cousin who lives there. “It’s somebody I haven’t seen in many, many years,” he said. “I have a whole range of other relatives—other cousins and their children—that I barely remember.”

When asked if he got emotional when Obama talked about Cuba earlier this week, Chicola laughed and then said, “No.”