Foreign Correspondence

[Amaunet]

Cuba to Open Four Caricom Embassies

Chavez, thorn in Bush’s side and economic lifeline for Cuba another thorn in Bush’ side, is also gaining vast influence in the Caribbean along with that major thorn in Bush’s side, China.

The Caribbean- Chávez was in Jamaica Tuesday to finalize details on the PetroCaribe agreement signed in June. The deal, which is meant to help small Caribbean economies cope with high fuel prices, offers generous financing for oil sales and favorable rates in exchange for goods, services, or credit. Thirteen of the 15 members of the Caribbean Community group, or Caricom, have already signed on.
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China is waging an aggressive campaign of seduction in the Caribbean, wooing countries away from relationships with rival Taiwan, opening markets for its expanding economy, promising to send tourists, and shipping police to Haiti in the first communist deployment in the Western Hemisphere.

And the United States, China's Cold War enemy, is benignly watching the Asian economic superpower move into its backyard.
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-Am

Cuba to Open Four Caricom Embassies

The Associated Press
Friday, March 10, 2006; 9:16 PM



GEORGETOWN, Guyana -- Cuba will open embassies in four more Caribbean countries _ a move that will give it a diplomatic presence in all 15 Caribbean Community nations, a Cuban official said Friday.

The embassies _ in Antigua, St. Vincent, Dominica and Suriname _ will open in about a month, said Alejandro Merchante Castellanos, Cuban ambassador to the 15-member Caribbean Community.

"We will be completing all the countries of Caricom," Castellanos said. "This is a decision of our country to develop relations with all of them. The integration of the Caribbean is very important to us."

Cuba's relations with Grenada and Suriname soured in the 1980s but the communist nation has earned praise from its Caribbean neighbors for its humanitarian work in the region.

Caricom has consistently voted in the United Nations to end the 46-year U.S. economic blockade of Cuba.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/10/AR2006031001996.html