(VOVworld) – The White House will decide in the next couple months about a potential trip by President Barack Obama to Cuba and wants both countries to take steps to ensure the thaw in relations is irreversible, US Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said on Saturday.

US President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro meet at the United Nations General Assembly in New York September 29, 2015. (Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque)

Rhodes, who was a key architect of the shift in US strategy to Cuba, told reporters in Hawaii that the key test for the US is whether the president’s visit to Cuba would help advance those priorities. At the end of 2015, Barack Obama publicly announced that he would visit Cuba before he will finish his term in 2017. If it happens, it will mark a historical event in relations between the US and Cuba. On the occasion to mark the first anniversary of normalization between US-Cuba relations on December 18^th, Cuban President Raul Castro emphasized principles for the two countries to improve their bilateral relations.