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Ailing Castro wins economic prize from Chinese leader

HAVANA, 23 (AFP) - Cuban President Fidel Castro (news - web sites) greeted China's President Hu Jintao in a wheelchair before the two sides sealed accords that will see major Chinese investment in the island's nickel industry.

The communist allies held several hours of talks on Monday night after witnessing the signing of 16 economic accords.

Hu was to complete his two day stay in Cuba -- capping a four-nation tour of Latin America -- by holding talks on Tuesday with Castro's brother Raul, who is his designated successor, and laying a wreath at the tomb of Cuba's 19 century independence hero Jose Marti.

The Cuban leader has been recovering from a broken knee since October. Despite having to welcome Hu from a wheelchair at the steps of the government palace, the 78-year-old Castro was dressed in a western business suit and shouted a lively "Viva China!" greeting.

Though communist China has embraced a role in a capitalist global production system, Cuba has not.

Beijing in turn has become a vital economic and political ally for the largely internationally isolated Castro.

"We sincerely wish that the Cuban people march without surrender on the road to building socialism," the Chinese leader said.

Hu said his "visit will achieve our goal of deepening our friendship and finance out cooperation," he said.

The economic accords are of crucial importance for Cuba, where the economy has plunged into crisis since the fall of the East Bloc. Castro made it clear before Hu's arrival that he expected significant investments.

Only two hours after his arrival, Hu and Castro publicly signed 16 cooperation agreements, including one boosting the extraction of nickel from Cuba's top world reserve estimated at 800 million tonnes.

The agreement calls for building an extraction facility that will produce 22,500 tons of nickel and cobalt per year.

Located in the Cuban province of Holguin, 800 kilometers (500 miles) east of Havana, the Las Cariocas plant will boost Cuban nickel production from its current 75,000 tonnes a year to almost 100,000 tonnes, a long-sought goal of the Cuban government.

The plant will be 49 percent owned by China's Minmetal and 51 percent by Cuba's Cubaniquel monopoly.

China and Europe are the chief importers of Cuban nickel.

Other agreements signed by Hu and Castro favor the biotechnology, tourism, telecommunications, fishing, education and health sectors.

On the sidelines of the presidential summit, representatives of 37 Chinese and about 60 Cuban companies met Monday to explore bilateral trade opportunities.

Cuba was the final stop on Hu's first Latin America tour since he became president in 2003.

He also went to Brazil, Argentina and Chile, where he attended the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum summit.

Castro, 78, who maintains the firm grip he has held over Cuba for 45 years, suffered a fall late last month which broke his left knee and confined him to a wheelchair.

Hu is making the third visit to Cuba by a Chinese president after his predecessor Jiang Zemin in 1993 and 2001. He is to leave Cuba late Tuesday (0100 GMT Wednesday).

Iran To Implement Water, Electricity Projects In Cuba

MADRID, Nov 23 Asia Pulse - Iran is to carry out two industrial projects to supply water and electricity to Cuba.

Iran`s Export Development Dank Manager Norouz Kohzadi and Cuban Minister of Government Cardio Cabrisas concluded the agreement to that effect in Cuba on Saturday, according to the Iranian embassy in Havana.

During a meeting, Kohzadi outlined aspects of the current banking cooperation between the two countries and expressed Iran`s readiness to provide the necessary financing for the projects at medium rate of return.

The Cuban minister welcomed the agreement, expressing his satisfaction over the trade and banking cooperation between the two countries. He stressed the importance of further boosting the two countries` economic cooperation.

The managing director of Sanir Company of Iran, who is currently in Havana, also elucidated on the modalities for implementation of the two industrial projects. The exact amount needed to finance the projects as well as Sanir Company`s undertaking to implement the project has still to be announced by the Iranian embassy in Havana. (IRNA)

Castro hails China's progress, but rejects capitalist reform

HAVANA, 23 (AFP) - President Fidel Castro heaped praise on China's progress but made it clear, with Chinese President Hu Jintao looking on, that Cuba would not adopt China's capitalist path to economic growth.

"Socialism will remain in the end the only real hope for peace and the survival of our species," said Castro, in a grey business suit instead of his usual olive fatigues, at a ceremony at the Palace of the Revolution.

From his wheelchair, Castro, 78, who is recovering from a fall and a broken knee, said Cuba and China share "the ideals of socialism," and that China "objectively speaking has become the most promising hope and the best example for all developing countries."

"I do not hesitate to say that it is now the main engine of world economic growth," Castro added.

Yet the Cuban president, whose government has backtracked on the few concessions to capitalism with which it has experimented, said: "each people must adapt its revolutionary strategy and goals to the specific conditions of its own country."

Castro briefly stood with a cane for the singing of national anthems. His son Antonio, a physician and traumatologist, handed his father the cane.

"In a country that was overwhelmingly rural, a vanguard of workers and intellectuals contributed to the poor and oppressed of China the enlightening ideas of socialism, inspired by the genius of (Karl) Marx, and the boundless daring and revolutionary talent of Lenin," Castro said.

Cuba and China, along with Vietnam, Laos and North Korea are the world's only remaining communist-ruled countries.

Hu met earlier with Castro's designated successor, his brother Raul Castro.

While there was no official departure from Cuba's current lack of openness to economic and political reform, Raul Castro, 73, hailed what he stressed was the Chinese Communist Party's role in boosting China's economic status while also insisting on social goals.

"China has achieved nothing short of a feat, transforming a poor, backward and multiethnic country into a genuine power," Raul Castro said at a business forum which his brother did not attend.

"But this was not a miracle; rather it was achieved through the guidance of the Communist Party, which led toward socialism -- using Chinese techniques -- to this growth," Raul Castro said.

In Cuba, "we, too, adopt socialism to buttress our independence and economic development," added Raul Castro, whom the president hand-picked as his successor despite the army chief's relative lack of popularity.

The visiting Chinese president, with Raul Castro at the forum, said: "We have a solid base on which to deepen our ties due to our broad political commonalities. We both have chosen the socialist road for our development."

But Hu did not address the glaring difference in choice of economic models between the communist allies: China has embraced a role in a capitalist global production system, booming along the way. Cuba has not and is in dire economic straits.

Beijing in turn has become a vital economic and political ally for the largely internationally isolated Fidel Castro.

Only two hours after his arrival, Hu and Fidel Castro publicly signed 16 cooperation agreements, including one boosting the extraction of nickel from Cuba's top world reserve estimated at 800 million tonnes.

The agreement calls for building an extraction facility that will produce 22,500 tons of nickel and cobalt per year.

Located in the Cuban province of Holguin, 800 kilometers (500 miles) east of Havana, the Las Cariocas plant will boost Cuban nickel production from its current 75,000 tonnes a year to almost 100,000 tonnes, a long-sought goal of the Cuban government.

The plant will be 49 percent owned by China's Minmetal and 51 percent by Cuba's Cubaniquel monopoly. China and Europe are the chief importers of Cuban nickel.

Cuba was the final stop on Hu's first Latin America tour since he became president in 2003. He also went to Brazil, Argentina and Chile, where he attended the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum summit.

Hu is making the third visit to Cuba by a Chinese president after his predecessor Jiang Zemin in 1993 and 2001. He is to leave Cuba late Tuesday (0100 GMT Wednesday).

Castro, China's leader talk

China's president conferred with Fidel Castro during a stopover in which potential business deals will be discussed.

Posted on Tue, Nov. 23, 2004.

HAVANA - (AP) -- Chinese President Hu Jintao met with Fidel Castro Monday for talks focusing on the broadening ties between Cuba and China, which has become the island's third-largest trading partner.

The Cuban leader, who shattered his left kneecap and broke his right arm in a fall last month, sat in a wheelchair as he greeted Hu and his wife, Liu Yongqing, in Havana's Palace of the Revolution.

Officials didn't disclose the substance of their private meeting, but Hu said in a statement the pair would discuss bilateral relations and international problems.

Hu was also expected to discuss possible business deals in the nickel, telecommunications and tourism sectors.

Relations between the two countries were tense during the Cold War, when the Caribbean island had a strong alliance with the Soviet Union. But since the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, political and commercial ties between Cuba and China have steadily grown.

China now trails only Venezuela and Spain in volume of trade with Cuba, comprising 10 percent of the island's foreign commerce, according to Ricardo Cabrisas, Cuba's minister of government.

The Chinese president flew in from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, which concluded Sunday in Santiago, Chile.

His visit to Havana coincided with a meeting of 400 or so Chinese and Cuban business leaders, whom Hu was expected to address Tuesday.

In remarks opening the two-day business forum, China's vice minister of commerce said trade between China and Cuba reached $401 million in the first 10 months of this year -- 36 percent more than in all of 2003.

In another development, North Korea's top military officer Kim Yong-Chun is heading a delegation that began an official visit to Cuba on Monday, according to an official statement.

Vice Marshal Kim, chief of the general staff of the Korean People's Army, and his delegation will visit the Revolutionary Armed Forces Ministry headed by President Fidel Castro's younger brother, Raúl Castro, according to the statement released in state-run newspapers. The North Korean delegation will also visit Cuban military units.

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