JO - Cuba slams Costa Rican president for comparing Castro to Pinochet
From my archive of press clippings:
Jamaica Observer
Cuba slams Costa Rican president for comparing Castro to Pinochet
AP
Thursday, December 28, 2006
HAVANA, Cuba (AP) - Cuba blasted Costa Rican president Oscar Arias yesterday for comparing ailing leader Fidel Castro to the late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, calling Arias an "opportunistic clown" who does the bidding of the US government.
In a statement published in the Communist Party daily Granma, the Cuban Foreign Ministry said it reacted with "profound indignation" to president Oscar Arias' comments likening Castro to his ideological foe.
"There is no difference" between the men, Arias said in an interview in Costa Rica last week. "The ideology differs, but both were savage, brutal and bloody."
Pinochet, who died on December 10 at age 91, was blamed for a political crackdown that killed nearly 3,200 people during his right-wing military rule from 1973 to 1990.
The 80-year-old Castro governed communist Cuba without interruption for more than 47 years until he temporarily ceded his powers to his younger brother Raul, following intestinal surgery on July 31.
The Washington-friendly Arias, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for helping broker an end to Central America's civil wars, has exchanged salvos with Cuban officials since he was elected earlier this year.
Cuban vice-president Carlos Lage and Arias quarrelled publicly in August after they suspended a meeting on re-establishing diplomatic relations between the two nations. Arias had also wanted to use the meeting to discuss civil rights on the island, but Lage rejected that idea.
In the statement yesterday, Cuba called Arias a "vulgar mercenary" of US officials and said Washington "always had on hand another opportunistic clown ready to follow its aggressive plans against Cuba".
"President Arias shamelessly supports the United States' annexation plan against Cuba and disrespects the heroic and selfless struggle of our people for their independence and sovereignty," the statement said.
The escalated spat comes with Castro still out of public view months after his surgery.
On Tuesday, a Spanish surgeon who recently treated Castro said in Madrid that the Cuban leader does not have cancer, as US intelligence officials have speculated, and insisted that he was recovering slowly but steadily from a serious operation.
Cuban authorities have not commented on last week's visit to the island by Dr Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido, the chief surgeon at Madrid's Gregorio Maranon Hospital.
Garcia Sabrido's statements to news media represented the first independent medical assessment of Castro's condition. The Cuban government has kept Castro's condition a state secret, occasionally releasing photographs and videos of him to show he is convalescing.
Jamaica Observer
Cuba slams Costa Rican president for comparing Castro to Pinochet
AP
Thursday, December 28, 2006
HAVANA, Cuba (AP) - Cuba blasted Costa Rican president Oscar Arias yesterday for comparing ailing leader Fidel Castro to the late Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, calling Arias an "opportunistic clown" who does the bidding of the US government.
In a statement published in the Communist Party daily Granma, the Cuban Foreign Ministry said it reacted with "profound indignation" to president Oscar Arias' comments likening Castro to his ideological foe.
"There is no difference" between the men, Arias said in an interview in Costa Rica last week. "The ideology differs, but both were savage, brutal and bloody."
Pinochet, who died on December 10 at age 91, was blamed for a political crackdown that killed nearly 3,200 people during his right-wing military rule from 1973 to 1990.
The 80-year-old Castro governed communist Cuba without interruption for more than 47 years until he temporarily ceded his powers to his younger brother Raul, following intestinal surgery on July 31.
The Washington-friendly Arias, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for helping broker an end to Central America's civil wars, has exchanged salvos with Cuban officials since he was elected earlier this year.
Cuban vice-president Carlos Lage and Arias quarrelled publicly in August after they suspended a meeting on re-establishing diplomatic relations between the two nations. Arias had also wanted to use the meeting to discuss civil rights on the island, but Lage rejected that idea.
In the statement yesterday, Cuba called Arias a "vulgar mercenary" of US officials and said Washington "always had on hand another opportunistic clown ready to follow its aggressive plans against Cuba".
"President Arias shamelessly supports the United States' annexation plan against Cuba and disrespects the heroic and selfless struggle of our people for their independence and sovereignty," the statement said.
The escalated spat comes with Castro still out of public view months after his surgery.
On Tuesday, a Spanish surgeon who recently treated Castro said in Madrid that the Cuban leader does not have cancer, as US intelligence officials have speculated, and insisted that he was recovering slowly but steadily from a serious operation.
Cuban authorities have not commented on last week's visit to the island by Dr Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido, the chief surgeon at Madrid's Gregorio Maranon Hospital.
Garcia Sabrido's statements to news media represented the first independent medical assessment of Castro's condition. The Cuban government has kept Castro's condition a state secret, occasionally releasing photographs and videos of him to show he is convalescing.
posted by Consul-At-Arms at 12:07 AM
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