BRUSSELS: The European Union has recalled its ambassador in Havana after he signed an open letter calling on US President Joe Biden to lift sanctions against Cuba, a spokesman said on Saturday.

Spanish diplomat Alberto Navarro will be asked why he took the initiative.

"We have asked the ambassador to come to Brussels to provide explanations" to Josep Borrell, the EU's foreign policy chief, a spokesman for his office told AFP. A group of 16 European deputies has already called for Navarro to be replaced, said the spokesman.

"We consider the ambassador is unworthy of the high office he occupies and which has been entrusted to him and we ask you to proceed with his immediate replacement," said a letter to Borrell from a cross-party group of MEPS. The signatories came from the centre-right European People's Party (EPP), the centrist Renew Europe group and the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR).