Johannesburg, June 26 (RHC) -– Hundreds of South Africans from trade unions and civil society groups held a rally in Johannesburg on Thursday to call for an end to the U.S. economic blockade of Cuba, the Fulton County News publication reports.

“Now that the United States is normalizing relations with Cuba, it should lift and end the blockade,” Chris Matlhako, secretary general of the Friends of Cuba Society in South Africa, told the gathering.

He said the U.S. blockade on Cuba limits the country’s ability to develop and advance economically. “We call for the immediate lifting of this blockade,” he said at the rally, also attended by the Cuban Five, the Cuban anti-terrorism fighters that were unfairly imprisoned in the United States for monitoring terrorist organizations based in South Florida.