Barack Obama’s historic peace-deal with Cuba after 50 years of cold war hostility was a breakthrough not to be sniffed at.

But that didn’t stop the US president having a try, when he got close and personal to a Cuban on Wednesday … not a citizen, but a cigar.

Significantly, it was the first time in 52 years that a US president has officially savoured the Cuban delicacy since John F. Kennedy stockpiled a secret stash of his favourite Havanas in the hours before he imposed a trade embargo on the Communist state in 1962.

This, of course, doesn’t include Bill Clinton’s adventures with cigars and Monica Lewisnky in the Oval Office.

Close to a Cuban: Obama was attending one of two White House receptions to welcome the start of Hanukkah when a guest handed him a large cheroot, which he took in his hand and ran under his nose

Obama was attending one of two White House receptions to welcome the start of Hanukkah when a guest handed him a large stogie.

He took it in his hand and waved it in the air before running it under his nose for a whiff.

The room fell near-silent as he paused to take in its aroma, before declaring it ‘pretty good’ to everyone’s relief.

‘I had the unique distinction of gifting the President of the United States with one of Cuba’s finest cigars, a Montecristo Series at the White House…after a ceremony in which a Menorah was lit,’ John Berzner, who offered the cigar to the president on Wednesday, told ABC News.

He had packed just one cigar for the event, but felt compelled to present it to Barack Obama in celebration of the deal to begin normalising relations between the United States and Cuba, after 18 months of secret talks over prisoner releases brought a sudden end to decades of tension.

‘Pretty good’: The room fell near-silent as he paused to take in its aroma, before declaring it ‘pretty good’ to everyone’s relief

When Berzner handed the cigar to Obama, he said: ‘Mr. President, a Cuban cigar for you!‘

‘Oh, nice!‘ Obama replied as he lifted the cigar to his nose.

‘The finest,’ Berzner replied. The president approved, telling Berzner, ‘Pretty good!‘

Nigel Savage, who was also a guest at the event and shot the video, added, ‘The president definitely looked like he appreciated a good Cuban cigar.’

It is unclear whether Obama kept the gift or handed it to the Secret Service.

Legal again: President Barack Obama lifted some of America’s sanctions against Cuba on Wednesday, making it legal for Americans who travel there to bring back a limited supply of cigars

The president’s smoking habits have long been in the news.

Obama last year told a United Nations official that he hadn’t smoked a cigarette in years — mostly because of First Lady Michelle Obama.

‘I haven’t had a cigarette in probably six years,’ Obama was overhead telling Maina Kiai at the U.N. General Assembly in New York back in September 2013.

‘That’s because I’m scared of my wife.’

In 2009, the president said he was a ‘former smoker’ but he would ‘constantly struggle‘ with kicking the habit.

‘Have I fallen off the wagon sometimes? Yes,‘ he confessed at a press conference in 2009. ‘Am I a daily smoker, a constant smoker? No.

‘I don’t do it in front of my kids, I don’t do it in front of my family,‘ he added.

‘And, you know, I would say that I am 95 percent cured. But there are times where…There are times where I mess up.’

Michelle Obama in February 2011 said her husband stopped smoking about a year earlier.

President John F. Kennedy was partial to a puff and even asked his press secretary to buy him 1,000 of his favorite Cuban cigars in the hours before he imposed the Cuban trade embargo

Obama is not the first US president to enjoy Cuban Cigars on occasion.

It emerged this week that President John F. Kennedy ordered his press secretary on February 2, 1962 to buy him as many of his favorite Cuban cigars as he could lay his hands on – and held off signing the Cuban trade embargo until his precious stogies were safely inside the White House.

Kennedy asked Pierre Salinger to find at least 1,000 H.Upmann petit coronas, and gave him just a half-day to accomplish the task before they would become contraband.

The next morning, Salinger recalled in rare video footage of his storytelling, he reported that he had bought up 1,200 of Cuba’s finest exports – a feat the president pronounced ‘Fantastic!’ just before he signed a decree that banned all the communist country’s products from the U.S.

Washington already had some limited sanctions in place, but Kennedy’s decision was the beginning of a comprehensive ban on U.S. trade with the island that remained intact until Wednesday.

In 1996 the Helms-Burton law tightened the sanctions further.

But President Barack Obama made a shocking move on Wednesday to reopen relations with Cuba and establish an embassy there.

That means Americans who travel to Havana – and there will be thousands – ‘will be able to return to the U.S. with some Cuban products, including Cohibas and other Cuban cigars,’ according to Cigar

Aficionado magazine.
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