October 20, 2001	Saturday	Shaba'an 2, 1422

HAVANA: Cuba strongly objects to Russia’s announced closure of an electronic intelligence centre on the Caribbean island — a move Havana says is Moscow’s “special gift” to Washington — stoking a new public dispute between the two countries, though Cuba is calling for negotiations.

“The agreement on the Lourdes Electronic Radar Station has not been cancelled, since Cuba has not given its approval,” the Fidel Castro government said on Thursday in an official statement released in response to Russian president Vladimir Putin’s Wednesday decision.

In the statement, Castro states that “Russia shall continue negotiating with the Cuban government, given that there are still important issues to resolve with regard to the matter.”

In the international context in which, “at this very moment, the US government’s stance is more aggressive and belligerent than ever,” the dismantling of the Lourdes intelligence base “would constitute a grave threat to Cuba’s security,” says the text.

Putin said on Wednesday, in a reportedly contentious meeting with Russia’s top military brass and government ministers, that the country’s bases at Lourdes, outside Havana, and at Cam Ranh, in Vietnam, would be dismantled over the next year.

The Russian chief of the General Staff, Anatoly Kvashnin, said his country’s decision comes “as a result of the change in the military-political situation in the world, and in view of the savings in financial resources,” as the annual lease on the radar station in Cuba is approximately 200 million dollars, not including the costs of maintaining the centre’s personnel.

“With this money we can buy and launch 20 reconnaissance satellites, and purchase around 100 radars,” said Kvashnin, according to the official Cuban communique.

Putin’s announcement marked an abrupt end to the negotiations that had been under way with Havana, which the Castro government interprets as a concession to Washington coming just prior to a meeting between the Russian leader and his US counterpart, George W. Bush.

Russia’s urgency to make public the decision to immediately dismantle the Lourdes base stemmed from Putin’s wish to present Bush with two important pieces of news, says the Cuban communique.

“It is easy to understand how much they would please their recipient: the one regarding Cam Ranh, although unimportant in reality, is highly symbolic; the one concerning Cuba would be a special gift,” states the Castro government.

Despite his disagreement with the decision, Castro indicated that “Cuba will refrain for the moment from making any judgments or criticisms” regarding Putin’s announcement. Perhaps the Russian president “did not have a chance to hear our well- founded arguments and suggestions on the matter in time, before making his public announcement.”

The Lourdes radar station was built in 1964, two years after the missile crisis that brought the world to the brink of a nuclear war — and which sparked the first major public disagreement between Moscow and Havana.

That crisis ended after Nikita Khrushchev, then secretary general of the Soviet Union’s Communist Party, negotiated with the United States the withdrawal of the missiles installed in Cuba.

The Moscow-Washington agreement saved the world from a nuclear conflict, but Castro was upset that Cuba had not been included in the decision-making process. He had wanted the missiles to stay.—Dawn/The InterPress News Service.