Republican senator John McCain declared he would keep the US trade embargo on Cuba if elected president, accusing Barack Obama of being soft on the communist country.

Bush, who tightened the embargo in 2003, is expected to reinforce McCain in a speech on Cuba on Wednesday, the Guardian reported.

On Tuesday, McCain's speech on Cuba has opened the battle for the swing state of Florida in the presidential elections.

McCain said Obama's support for lifting the embargo and the offer of the Democratic presidential candidate to talk to Raul Castro "would send the worst possible signal to Cuba's dictators - there is no need to undertake fundamental reforms, they can simply wait for a unilateral change in US policy."

Many Cuba experts say the US policy towards the Western Hemisphere's only communist country hasn't worked and needs changing as nearly five decades of a US trade embargo have failed to dislodge the Cuban government.

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