HAVANA For Olguita Sierra, the shift in U.S. policy allowing Cuban-Americans to make unlimited trips and money transfers to the island came a month too late.

The 72-year-old's son Sergio lives in Miami and had not been eligible for a trip to Cuba until next year. His request for an emergency visa was pending in March when his father passed away.

"What hurts me most is that my husband died just a little while ago without seeing him," Sierra said. "If only Obama had made this decision sooner."

Word that President Barack Obama had loosened restrictions on family travel and remittances among other measures softening U.S. sanctions against the communist-run country elicited cheers in Havana on Monday.

Under the Bush administration rules, Cuban-Americans were eligible to travel here only every three years and send up to $300 to relatives every three months. Monday's action eliminated those limits in the hope that less dependence on their government will lead Cubans to demand progress on political freedoms.

Former Cuban president Fidel Castro responded Monday by calling on Obama to lift the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba.

"The conditions are in place for Obama to use his talent in a constructive policy that ends something that has failed for nearly half a century," Castro wrote in a column on the Web site of Granma, the official newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party.

Nearly all Cubans work for the government, earning an average of 414 pesos just $19.70 a month