|
|||||
|
|||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||||
 |
 |
    |
|
|
|||
 |
|
||
|
|||
|
|
|
|
||||||||
|
Cuba: Havana Developing Weapons, Aiding Rogue States, Bolton Says Cuba has developed a biological weapons program and could be sharing biological warfare research with other rogue states, a top U.S. State Department official said yesterday (see GSN, Jan. 11). “The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort,” Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control and Nonproliferation John Bolton said in a speech to the Heritage Foundation. During the past 40 years, Cuba has developed a sophisticated biomedical industry, aided until 1990 by the former Soviet Union, that is one of the most advanced in Latin America, Bolton said. Cuban defectors and experts, however, have cast suspicion on what other research efforts Cuban biomedical facilities have conducted, he said (U.S. State Department release, May 6). Cuba is now believed to have experimented with anthrax and a few other deadly microbes, Bush administration officials said. Ken Alibek, who was once a senior scientist for the former Soviet Union’s biological weapons program, told a congressional committee last fall that he believed Cuba is capable of making genetically modified biological weapons, weapons that could not be defeated by U.S. vaccines and antibiotics (Judith Miller, New York Times, May 7). Cuba has also provided other rogue states with dual-use biotechnology, which could be used to help develop biological weapons programs in those countries, Bolton said. He quoted a speech made by Cuban leader Fidel Castro last year at Tehran University, which said, “Iran and Cuba, in cooperation with each other, can bring America to its knees. The U.S. regime is very weak, and we are witnessing this weakness from close up” (U.S. State Department release, May 6). Several Cuban defectors have previously raised concerns about Cuban aid to other rogue states, said Stephen Johnson, a Latin American affairs expert at the Heritage Foundation. One example Johnson gave was Jose de la Fuente, a former scientist at the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology in Havana, who reported that Cuba has sold Iran equipment to produce the recombinant hepatitis B vaccine (see GSN, Oct. 12, 2001). Such equipment, however, could also be used to produce biological weapons agents, according to Johnson. While Cuba has spent millions on advanced biomedical equipment, there are still often shortages of basic medical goods, which has also increased U.S. suspicions, Johnson said. “That’s one of the things that has John Bolton worried,” Johnson said (Paul Richter, Los Angeles Times, May 7). “We know that Cuba is collaborating with other state sponsors of terror,” Bolton said. “We call on Cuba to cease all BW [biological weapons]-applicable cooperation with rogue states and to fully comply with all of its obligations under the Biological Weapons Convention” (U.S. State Department release, May 6). “A Downright Lie” The Cuban Interest Office in Washington denied Cuba was producing biological weapons. Bolton’s claims are “ridiculous, absurd and a downright lie,” said spokesman Luis Mariano Fernandez. “They’re not just lies, but big lies,” Fernandez said. The Bush administration stance that Cuba is involved in biological weapons is only political pandering to Cuban exiles in the United States, said Wayne Smith, former top U.S. diplomat in Cuba under the Carter administration. “There is simply no hard, convincing evidence,” Smith said. “There is no real evidence other than hearsay” (Eaton/Corchado, Dallas Morning-News, May 7). Cuban Threat Underestimated, Bolton Says The Cuban threat to U.S. security has been underplayed, Bolton said, citing a 1998 U.S. report that said Cuba did not pose a significant military threat to the United States or the region. Then-Defense Secretary William Cohen, however, had prefaced the report with concerns over Cuba’s ability to produce biological weapons, Bolton said. A major reason why the report played down the threat posed by Cuba was because of Cuba’s intensive intelligence operations within the United States, Bolton said, giving the example of Ana Belen Montes, a senior Cuba analyst for the Defense Intelligence Agency, who helped prepare the report. Montes was later found to have been recruited to spy for Cuba, he said (U.S. State Department release, May 6).
| ||||||||||
Back to top
