The New York
Times
Cuba and Russia Abandon Nuclear Plant, an Unfinished Vestige of the
Soviet Era
By Patrick E. Tyler. December 18, 2000
HAVANA, Dec. 17 — Lacking financing to finish what they started almost
two decades ago, Russia and Cuba have agreed to abandon an incomplete nuclear
power station at Juragua on the southern coast of the island, Russian officials
traveling with President Vladimir V. Putin said during the weekend.
The decision was reached after President Fidel Castro told Mr. Putin during
four rounds of talks last week that Cuba was no longer interested in completing
the twin 440- megawatt reactor plant that would have provided a significant
addition to Cuba's dilapidated electrical power grid.
Separately, Russian officials said Mr. Putin had offered to forgive 70
percent of Cuba's Soviet-era debt, estimated at $20 billion. Mr. Putin was said
to have pressed Mr. Castro to recognize even a small portion of the debt and to
commit his country to a schedule of payment under the system of the so-called
Paris club of creditor nations.
But from all accounts emerging from the talks, Mr. Castro is thus far
unwilling to recognize any of his debt to Moscow, claiming instead that the
abrupt Soviet and Russian withdrawal from Cuba beginning a decade ago caused
billions in dollars of damage to the Cuban economy.
Mr. Putin, who left for a visit to Canada today, appeared to have fared no
better in talks on how Russia might recover past investments in Cuba by taking
stock positions in Cuban enterprises. Russian officials have concluded that the
most profitable of Cuba's industries — oil, nickel, cigar exports and
telecommunications — already have sufficient foreign partners.
Still, there are dozens of small and medium-sized state factories in Cuba
operating on Russian designs with Russian machinery and Mr. Putin's entourage
expressed the hope that this trip had laid the groundwork for a Russian return
to the Cuban market, though the Russians were under no illusions about how
difficult this might prove to be.
Though neither side has yet publicly announced the decision on the fate of
the nuclear power station, it is certain to be welcomed in the United States,
where the Clinton administration, members of Congress and a number of
environmental groups have expressed concerns about whether the plants could be
operated safely by Cuba's state-run electrical authority.
Since 1996, Russia and Cuba have been seeking third-country financing to
complete the plant. Its foundations were 90 percent complete when work was
halted in 1992, and about 40 percent of the heavy machinery had been installed.
Some Russian press reports have said that at least one of the reactors —
without nuclear fuel — and its steam turbine set were delivered to Cuba.
The Soviet Union signed the agreement to build the twin reactor plant in
1976. The V.V.E.R. design, which was the most advanced at the time, was the
first to be exported by Moscow for use in a tropical climate. It differs from
the Chernobyl-style design in that the radioactive core and fuel elements are
contained within a pressurized steel vessel.
Work began in 1983, after which Cuban engineers encountered significant
problems in meeting construction targets. Russian engineers had taken over the
project by the early 1990's.
The decision on what to do with the Juragua plant was a major item of
unfinished business between Havana and Moscow after the collapse of the Soviet
Union. And Mr. Putin was said to be keen not to announce Russia's desire to back
out of the project until Cuban officials first expressed their own desire to
walk away. In this manner, the officials said, Moscow felt it would no longer be
liable for millions of dollars in costs required to maintain the incomplete
installation.
In Spotlight With Putin, Castro Discovers Value of Old Friend
By Patrick E. Tyler. December 17, 2000
HAVANA, Dec. 16 — Only a month ago, Fidel Castro was characterizing
Russia as just another cash-strapped third world country, whose former
president, Boris N. Yeltsin, had sold out the socialist vision by breaking up
the Soviet Union in 1991, supposedly over a bottle of vodka, with the leaders of
Ukraine and Belarus.
But when President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia arrived this week on a state
visit to revive the ties between Moscow and Havana — and to try to clear
the backlog of $20 billion Cuba owes to its former patron — President
Castro summoned brass bands to trumpet the "reconfirmation of friendship,"
as the Communist Party newspaper put it Friday. The news about the debt was
buried.
Behind the switch, according to Cuban analysts and foreign diplomats here,
lay a calculation: Mr. Putin's arrival, his first stop on his first journey to
the Americas as president, has once again revived Mr. Castro's diminished
fortunes as a charismatic leader, who after four decades in power holds sway
only over an impoverished revolution.
"The visit of the president of Russia shows the people that Castro is
still important, and that is critical because it helps Fidel to keep mobilizing
the people," said a foreign envoy who has spent a decade watching the Cuban
leader here.
A more recently arrived Western diplomat said, "He is trying to
recapture his position on the world stage, not through arms and subversion
anymore, but through rhetoric and leadership in the third world, where leaders
look to him for help in shaping their arguments."
Some of the gloss seems to be off Mr. Castro's appeal at home, however, even
though his power is secure and reinforced by a totalitarian party structure and
ample security services.
"The government used to have the absolute support of the people, but it
has lost that support," said Óscar Espinosa, an economist who had to
shovel bat dung for two years after he first criticized Mr. Castro's economic
policies in the 1960's, but who continues to do so today.
The loss of "political capital," as Mr. Espinosa terms it, flows
from the economic turmoil of the 1990's when the withdrawal of Soviet and
Russian subsidies caused the Cuban economy to contract by 35 percent, forcing
Mr. Castro to undertake reforms he had long opposed.
He "dollarized" the economy, allowing Cubans to receive dollars
from abroad and trade in them at home. He solicited foreign investment, selling
half the country's cigar export monopoly to the Spanish. Canada is buying into
the nickel sector and Europeans into the oil sector.
He opened the doors to tourists as never before, with nearly two million
visiting this year. He also legalized self-employment, small private restaurants
in homes and small agricultural markets.
"The enemy's money is the only money that is really worth something in
Cuba today," Mr. Espinosa said, adding that since fewer than half of Cubans
have access to dollars by working in the tourism industry or by receiving
remittances from relatives in the United States, social inequities between the "dollar
haves" and the "dollar have-nots" are mounting.
"This could lead to an economic backlash with extraordinary
consequences," Mr. Espinosa said, though he and most analysts here do not
see any immediate threat to Mr. Castro's rule.
"Fidel Castro has been the most skillful and clever political figure in
our history," said Elizardo Sánchez, a leading dissident whom Mr.
Castro has imprisoned three times for a total of eight and a half years.
But Mr. Sánchez believes that he is not just stating the obvious when
he says Mr. Castro's regime is in its "terminal phase," not only
because Mr. Castro turned 74 this year, but also because the last decade has
cracked open the door to economic independence for 11 million Cubans. "He
has always controlled everyone through the economy," Mr. Espinosa asserted.
A decade ago, said Mr. Sánchez, 57, fewer than a dozen dissidents
dared to criticize Mr. Castro's regime openly. "Now there are thousands of
dissidents acting throughout the country," he said.
Twice this year, Mr. Castro has led tens of thousands of Cubans on marches
along Havana's waterfront, capitalizing on his "victory" over the
United States in the battle to bring Elián González home from
Florida after he lost his mother when she and others fled Cuba in a boat.
Mr. Castro is said to have taken great energy from the struggle. On a vacant
lot facing the American diplomatic mission here, he has erected the José
Martí Anti-Imperialism Plaza as a permanent protest against Washington.
Its most prominent feature is a statue of Martí, Cuba's national hero,
holding young Elián and pointing an accusing finger at the American
edifice.
But as a sign of the times, Cuban political humorists have spread the story
that Martí is simply advising the boy where to apply for a visa when he
is ready to return to Florida.
Putin, in Cuba, Signals Priority of Ties to U.S.
By Patrick E. Tyler. December 16, 2000
HAVANA, Dec. 15 — After two difficult days of talks about old debts
and dashed dreams with Fidel Castro, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said
today that he did not travel to this former bastion of the cold war to recreate
a "union" with Cuba against the United States, but rather to clean up
the economic "mess" left over from the Soviet era.
Speaking at a news conference that was not attended by the Cuban leader, Mr.
Putin indicated in several ways that Russia's relations with the United States,
though difficult at times, were important to Moscow.
Still, he said that Moscow would not hesitate to express opposing views on
arms control issues, on questions of international security and on how to narrow
the gap between the "golden billion" and the world's poorest nations,
a new theme for him.
Responding to a question on whether his visit here amounted to
re-establishing an alliance between Moscow and Havana, Mr. Putin said: "Unfortunately,
you have been looking at the wrong kind of information. We have no union with
Cuba against third countries, including the United States if you were talking
about that country.
"Yes, we have differences on some questions with the United States and
they are well known," he continued, but he said that these were "items
of discussion and no more than that."
Stressing this point, Mr. Putin disclosed today that he had authorized his
foreign minister, Igor S. Ivanov, to sign an agreement with the outgoing Clinton
administration calling for advance notification of rocket launchings to further
promote communication among the extensive nuclear forces of the United States
and Russia. Mr. Putin said he "deeply" hoped the agreement would be
concluded today, or in the near future.
Mr. Ivanov was said to be negotiating the agreement in Brussels with
Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright.
In his remarks today, Mr. Putin appeared to be trying to put his visit to
Cuba in an unthreatening context, suggesting that Moscow is merely trying to
recover lost markets and multimillion-dollar Soviet-era investments rather than
forge a new image of rivalry.
And the subtext of his remarks, together with comments by Russian officials
traveling with Mr. Putin, also indicated that the thorny economic issues
underlying Moscow's relations with Cuba did not compare to the more weighty
economic and security agenda that Mr. Putin intends to pursue with the new
administration in Washington.
As an example, Mr. Putin cited his pardon on Thursday — as a "goodwill
gesture" — of Edmond Pope, the former American naval intelligence
officer convicted of espionage in Moscow this month and sentenced to 20 years in
prison.
Mr. Putin said he had no reason to doubt the appropriateness of the guilty
verdict against the 54-year-old businessman, but added that the activities of
intelligence agencies, charged with protecting national security, "should
not inflict damage on relations between nations, the more so in the case of such
key countries as Russia and the United States."
On another point about continuing intelligence activities, the Russian
leader indicated that the 1,500 Russian military technicians who operate an
electronic eavesdropping facility at Lourdes, outside the Cuban capital and used
to intercept communications in the United States, may not be here permanently. "Russia
and Cuba at this specific moment are interested that this center will continue
to work," he said, adding, "and then we'll see."
As he prepared for the final rounds of tough negotiations with Mr. Castro
over whether Cuba intends to even recognize the estimated $20 billion in debt
that accumulated during three decades of Soviet patronage here, Mr. Putin also
went out of his way to compliment the skill and experience of the foreign policy
advisers that President-elect George W. Bush is gathering around him in
Washington.
"Judging by the staff surrounding the president-elect," Mr. Putin
observed, "these people are quite well- known professionals, who deeply
understand the nuances in relations between the two states."
The Russian leader was clear about the major differences of opinion: Moscow
opposes Mr. Bush's advocacy of abrogating the anti-ballistic missile treaty of
1972 in order to build an anti-missile shield over the United States.
In addition, he said, "we don't think that the principle of
humanitarian intervention is right." He was referring to NATO's decision in
1999 to intervene militarily in Kosovo to stop Serbian ethnic violence against
civilians there.
While Mr. Putin was speaking with reporters in Havana, Russian state
television was airing a lengthy interview with Mr. Castro.
Though Mr. Castro extolled the new friendship between Russia and Cuba, he
restated his grievance that Cuba had been "left alone" by the
circumstances of Soviet collapse and Russian withdrawal from Cuba, which had to
face "the most powerful state in the world."
Mr. Castro made no reference to Cuba's residual debts to Moscow, and he
avoided discussion of the complicated economic issues that he and Mr. Putin are
trying to resolve.
Mr. Putin and Mr. Castro will retreat to the luxurious beach resort of
Varadero this weekend to try to conclude some common understanding of how Moscow
and Havana can put substance behind the new vocabulary of friendship and
economic cooperation.
Mr. Putin said Russians have several goals in this first foray back to Latin
America since Mr. Putin was elected last March. "The first one is the
activation of relations in the political sphere, cleaning up the mess and
choosing priorities of cooperation between the two states in the economic
sphere," he said.
The Russian leader indicated today that Moscow has spent $30 million in
recent years "conserving" its investment in a large nuclear power
station at Jurgua near Cienfuegos, but had come to no agreement about how to
complete the plant. Russian officials traveling with Mr. Putin indicated that
Cuba is no longer interested in completing the nuclear complex, but there has
been no public confirmation of this position from Mr. Castro's government.
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