US claims on Cuba ridiculed

Ex-President Jimmy Carter, on a visit to Havana, has ridiculed claims from the Bush administration that Cuba is developing germ warfare facilities.

After having visited Cuba’s main biotechnology laboratory, the centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, which performs vanguard feats of scientific development, cocking a snook at the US-imposed blockade, Jimmy Carter described the accusations as not being coincidental, since this was the first visit to Cuba from a former US President since Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.

He explained that he had had several briefings with US intelligence personnel and he claimed that he had asked them, more than once, if there was any evidence that Cuba was sharing information with terrorist organisations. “The answer from our experts on terrorism was ‘No’ “, he said.

Luis Herrera, the director of the centre, told Jimmy Carter that the plant supposedly fabricating biological weapons in Iran is not operating and that information that the Cubans are collaborating with Iran or Iraq is “completely wrong”.

Ex-president Jimmy Carter’s visit to Cuba comes one week after US Under-Secretary of State John Bolton made inflammatory remarks at (or after) a dinner, accusing Cuba of supplying information to “rogue states” and of developing germ warfare facilities, based on rumours by disaffected Cuban elements in Miami.

Washington would do well to liase with Cuban intelligence operationals and learn something from Havana’s shining example of how a state can operate with limited resources and still provide valuable aid to developing countries.

Marcia MIRANDA PRAVDA.Ru BRAZIL