Washington, Apr 12 (EFE).– U.S. media outlets on Sunday discussed the “historic” meeting between U.S. President Barack Obama and his Cuban counterpart, Raul Castro, saying it was a key milestone in a new era of relations between the two countries.

The daily Washington Post, which led in its online edition with the Saturday meeting of the two leaders at the 7th Summit of the Americas in Panama, said that the pair “symbolically ended more than a half-century of official estrangement between the United States and Cuba … in a historic-face-to-face meeting that Obama said put them on ‘a path toward the future.'”

“Obama’s welcome of Cuba here ended a long-standing irritant with Latin America, most of which mended fences with Cuba decades ago, and added a potential legacy issue to his presidency alongside a nuclear deal with Iran, assuming he is able to achieve it,” said the daily.

However, the paper also discussed Republican anger over the meeting, a reference to their disapproval with the administration’s new stance toward Havana and expressed on Saturday by a number of conservative presidential hopefuls including former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and one of the senators from that state, Marco Rubio.

In another piece about the summit, the Post insisted that the meeting will be “remembered for its symbolism of reconciliation.”

Meanwhile, CNN emphasized the “surprising” words the Cuban leader uttered during his speech before the