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Cuba's Raul Castro on milestone Russia visit
2009-01-28
MOSCOW (AFP) - Cuban President Raul Castro on Wednesday arrived in Russia on the first visit by a Cuban leader since the Cold War aiming to revive Soviet-era ties. The visit comes as both countries watch for change in the foreign policy of the United States, which came under heavy Russian criticism in the era of George W. Bush and which maintains a blockade on the Communist island. Castro, who took over as president from his brother Fidel in 2006, said before the visit he wanted to expand relations with Russia -- healing a rift that appeared with the Soviet Union's collapse and the end of Soviet subsidies. "We know what happens on the planet when equality is destroyed, when they start wars, attacks and are unjust in their relations," he said in a clear reference to the United States, quoted by ITAR-TASS. "We, like many others, see Russia's rebirth as a positive factor," Castro told the Russian news agency. "Relations between Russia and Cuba are excellent and this visit to Moscow will serve to strengthen ties between our countries." Castro's visit begins in earnest when he is hosted on Thursday by President Dmitry Medvedev at a country residence west of Moscow usually used for special guests of the Russian leader. Formal talks between the two delegations will take place the following day at the Kremlin in Moscow. Relations already took a turn for the better last November when Medvedev visited Havana on a Latin American tour aimed at restoring what he called "privileged" Soviet-era relations with the region. In December a group of Russian warships visited Havana on a tour seen as a deliberate attempt to challenge US dominance in Latin America, although US officials have remained sanguine about such Russian manoeuvres. On the current visit the focus will be on tying up a raft of business deals that include plans for a Russian consortium to explore oil fields off Cuba's coast in the Gulf of Mexico and plans for cooperation in nickel production on the island, officials have said. Russia also may well reaffirm its support for the lifting of the US economic blockade of Cuba. "Our country has consistently stood for normalising the situation around Cuba, for its fully fledged reintegration into regional and world processes," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in comments released Wednesday. "What is important is that Latin American countries are united in their efforts to overcome Havana's isolation," Lavrov said. The two countries have in the last couple of years emphasized their wish to revive a relationship that flourished in the Soviet era when Moscow was the island's main sponsor and that came to a sudden halt with the Soviet collapse. A 2001 decision by president Vladimir Putin to shut down a Russian military base and radar station on the island only worsened a by then frosty relationship. Detecting a new spirit of cooperation, the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta highlighted Raul Castro's several Soviet-era visits to Moscow between 1960 and 1984 as well as a visit he made to Communist-ruled Romania in 1953. "It looks like Raul's visit is a return to his youth," declared Nezavisimaya. "As soon as contact began to be restored in the middle of the first decade of this century it became clear that the mutual interest and even attraction had not disappeared," it added. Beyond Friday, the programme for the 77-year-old Cuban leader's visit remained unpublished. Fidel Castro last arrived on an official visit to Russia in 1977, according to a Kremlin official. He also visited the country in 1987 for celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the October Revolution, according to the Latin America Institute in Moscow.
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