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Cuba says US aid offer
looked like funding for dissidents
Dominican
Today, Dominican
Republic, November 3, 2005.
Havana.- Cuba's Communist government on
Thursday disputed the Bush administration's
version of events over possible U.S. disaster
relief to the island, saying Washington's
offer appeared to be an attempt to continue
backing dissidents "using the hurricane
as a pretext."
The U.S. government on Wednesday canceled
the dispatch of a team of experts to Cuba
to evaluate damage from Hurricane Wilma,
saying Havana wanted to turn the trip into
a political matter.
"We are unwilling to turn a humanitarian
mission into a political dialogue on issues
not related to providing relief to the Cuban
victims of Hurricane Wilma," State
Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.
"Cuba rejects the notion that it sought
to modify the objective of the visit by
U.S. officials, along with the idea that
by accepting the visit we wanted to obtain
political advantage," said a communiqué
issued Thursday by the Cuban foreign ministry.
Last week, the State Department announced
that Cuba, in an unprecedented move by the
Communist regime, had accepted U.S. assistance
to help deal with the damage caused by Hurricane
Wilma late last month.
"However," McCormack said Wednesday,
"in subsequent discussions the Castro
regime changed the team's mission, limiting
their ability to assess the situation of
the Cuban people impacted by Hurricane Wilma.
The Cuban government instead wants to use
the assessment team's mission to discuss
the Cuban government's vision for regional
disaster response."
The Cuban note said the offer of $100,000
to be distributed to hurricane victims by
non-governmental organizations "appears
to be a covert effort to deliver even more
financing, using the hurricane as a pretext,
to groups of mercenaries that the government
of the United States organizes and directs
in Cuba."
The 46-year-old regime maintains that advocates
of democracy, independent journalists and
human rights activists on the island are
"agents" of Washington, and has
jailed scores of them on such charges.
The Cuban foreign ministry reiterated in
Thursday's statement that no relief aid
had been requested, saying "it made
clear to the government of the United States
that it was not interested in economic evaluations,
but rather in establishing real and efficient
(disaster response) cooperation that would
benefit all peoples of the region."
That objective "remains on the table,"
it said.
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