CUBANEWS FROM RADIO HAVANA CUBA November 27, 1997 rhc@radiohc.org http://www.radiohc.org The following items are taken from Radio Havana Cuba English language service for Thursday, November 27, 1997. Today's stories: 1.- CUBAN FOREIGN MINISTRY ANNOUNCES 8TH ROUND OF CUBA-US MIGRATORY TALKS, SLATED FOR DECEMBER 2ND IN HAVANA 2.- HAVANA COURT SENTENCES US CITIZEN WALTER VAN DER VEER TO 15 YEARS IN PRISON ON CHARGES OF PROMOTING ARMED ACTIONS AGAINST CUBAN STATE 3.- LATIN AMERICAN HEALTH MINISTERS EXCHANGE IN HAVANA 4.- CUBAN DELEGATION AT ASSOCIATION OF CARIBBEAN STATES GATHERING IN COLOMBIA EXPRESSES SATISFACTION WITH REGIONAL BLOCK'S ON-GOING ADVANCES 5.- PEACE ACTIVISTS CONDEMN IMPERIALISM 6.- SUGAR INDUSTRY UPDATE 7.- TAXATION EXPERTS MEET IN HAVANA CUBAN FOREIGN MINISTRY ANNOUNCES 8TH ROUND OF CUBA-US MIGRATORY TALKS, SLATED FOR DECEMBER 2ND IN HAVANA Havana, November 27(RHC)-- Cuba's Foreign Ministry announced today the holding of the 8th round of Cuba-US migratory talks in Havana next December 2nd. In the traditional Thursday press conference, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alejandro Gonzalez said that, as is customary, the Cuban delegation will be headed by Parliament President Ricardo Alarcon. Migration accords signed by Washington and Havana in 1994 and 1995 put an end to the automatic asylum granted in the US to Cuban rafters and other illegal Cuban immigrants, while the US Interests Section in Havana agreed to grant 20 thousand visas a year to Cubans wishing to legally reside in the US. Since the agreements,US authorities have returned to Cuba close to 800 illegal Cuban immigrants. The 7th round of talks were held last July in New York. In other news, the Foreign Ministry spokesman termed as totally false a report in a conservative newspaper in Spain charging that separatist Basque terrorists were living in Cuba. Gonzalez said the allegations merited no further comment. HAVANA COURT SENTENCES US CITIZEN WALTER VAN DER VEER TO 15 YEARS IN PRISON ON CHARGES OF PROMOTING ARMED ACTIONS AGAINST CUBAN STATE Havana, November 27(RHC)-- A court in Havana sentenced late Wednesday US citizen Walter Van Der Veer to 15 years in prison, on charges of promoting an armed action against Cuba. Havana's district attorney's office had requested 20 years. The text of the sentence says that Van Der Veer is a declared enemy of Cuba's socialist state who attempted to promote subversive armed actions in the westerly Pinar Del Rio Province. For this purpose, continues the text, Van Der Veer clandestinely introduced military uniforms and other equipment, and was also planning to launch attacks against tourists in Cuba. Arrested in August of last year, Cuban authorities also discovered in his possession anti-Cuba propaganda and ink pads to print out pamphlets signed by the Cuban Liberation Front, a Cuban-American terrorist organization based in Miami. According to his defense attorney, Van Der Veer admitted to having spread anti-Castro propaganda in Havana and that he belonged to 2 Cuban exile organizations in Miami that promote the violent overthrow of the Cuban government. And according to testimony by a Cuban accomplice, Van Der Veer expressed interest in obtaining weapons on the island. Present at his trial last November 6th were US attorney Dominick Salfi and an official from the US Interests Section in Havana, David Stone. Following the trial, Van Der Veer said he wasn't interested in filing an appeal.and high-ranking Customs officials attended the meeting's first session. LATIN AMERICAN HEALTH MINISTERS EXCHANGE IN HAVANA Havana, November 27(RHC)-- Health ministers from Bolivia, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Saint Lucia and Cuba exchanged views on achievements and challenges regarding health care in their countries Thursday. The officials took part in a panel of the 6th International Seminar on Primary Health care, underway at Havana's Convention Center Guatemala's health minister Marcos Tulio Sosa spoke about his country's high mortality rate currently of 57 deaths per one thousand live births, and the serious difficulties 57% of Guatemalans have to access health care services. Guatemala is trying to expand health care coverage and to improve its quality, noted Minister Sosa. Bolivia's Health Minister Dr.Toti Marinkovich told the gathering that only 23% of his country's population is covered by social security and that new health care strategies are needed to fight increased infectious outbreaks in the country. For his part, Costa Rica's Health and Social Security Minister Dr. Alvador Salas explained how health professionals are working to rescue primary health care principles and to strengthen the family doctor program. Dr. Salas as well as other visiting officials praised Cuba's primary health care system and its back bone: the family doctor program. The 6th international seminar on primary health care "Health Care for All", is being attended by 1500 delegates from 23 nations and will wind up Friday. CUBAN DELEGATION AT ASSOCIATION OF CARIBBEAN STATES GATHERING IN COLOMBIA EXPRESSES SATISFACTION WITH REGIONAL BLOCK'S ON-GOING ADVANCES Cartagena de Indias, November 27(RHC)-- Cuban Vice Foreign Minister Isabel Allende expressed today Cuba's satisfaction with what she called the significant advances of the Association of Caribbean States, the ACS. Allende is heading the Cuban delegation to the 3rd ordinary gathering of the ACS's Council of Ministers that got underway today in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia. Havana, said Allende, is very pleased with the efforts to bring together the forces of the English, French and Spanish-speaking Caribbean to boost development in the sub-region. She said a quicker pace would be desirable, but that in reality it would be difficult to ask more of a regional organization that has only been in existence for 3 years. The mere fact of existing, said the Cuban Vice Foreign Minister, has transformed into reality an old dream of the region's nations, and this dream, she added, is going to make a qualitative leap into the 21st century. Allende said the goal in Cartagena is to take further steps towards a future free trade agreement, in the enhancement of air and maritime transportation to boost trade in the region, and the definition of strategies towards the creation of a zone of sustainable tourism. On the eve of the gathering, the Secretary General of the Association of Caribbean States -- Venezuelan Simon Molina Duarte --asserted that by the year 2010, this organization would be the 3rd most important regional block in the western hemisphere, along with South and North America. Besides advances in the creation of a zone of sustainable tourism and enhanced transportation in the region, Molina said the 3rd most important achievements of the ACS is the creation of mechanisms of coordination between countries of the Caribbean basin that will allow for emergency aid to small nations affected by natural disasters, which, he said, were frequent in the region. He said all the ACS's member nations are to some degree affected by globalization, liberalization and the opening up of markets. The Association of Caribbean States is made up of 25 nations, with 11 associate countries. The ACS gathering in Colombia, lasting through tomorrow, is also being attended by Brazil, Argentina, Ecuador, Spain, Italy and India as observer nations. PEACE ACTIVISTS CONDEMN IMPERIALISM Havana, November 27(RHC)-- Imperialist pretensions harm the principal interests of the people, asserts the Final Declaration of an International seminar on Peace, Sovereignty and a New World Order that gathered specialists from more than 20 countries in Havana. Participants in the event, sponsored by the Cuban Peace Movement, agreed that Globalization makes the goal of development an impossible task for Third World countries, their economies, cultures and peoples. The Cuban Peace Movement meeting also strongly rejected unilateral actions that violate the sovereignty of peoples and interfere in the development of world trade, like the US Helms-Burton and D'Amato-Kennedy Laws and the so called Graham Amendment, that would designate Cuba as a potential military enemy of the United States. SUGAR INDUSTRY UPDATE Havana, November 27(RHC)-- Cuba's new Sugar Industry Minister, Ulises Rosales del Toro, has praised the spirit of sacrifice exhibited by workers in the sugar industry, the nation's most important hard currency earner and one of the most affected by the economic crisis. The Sugar Minister was speaking to a national seminar held in Havana on the industry. Some 200 sugar industry leaders attended the event which was aimed at taking a close look at the industry's organization, efficiency, working conditions and other aspects of the sugar harvest that recently got underway. Also on the agenda was an analysis of types of bonus' to be awarded to encourage cane cutters known as members of the Millionaire's Brigades. The national meeting also examined strategies for the current harvest, necessary to achieve higher production through the use of more efficient work in both in agriculture and industry. TAXATION EXPERTS MEET IN HAVANA Havana, November 25 (RHC)-- An international seminar on taxes entered its second day of debates Thursday in the historic Ambos Mundos Hotel, in Old Havana. Some 73 experts from 15 Latin American countries and Canada are attending the meeting. This is the third encounter of its kind to take place in Cuba since the Island re-introduced taxes as part of its economic reform process. The gathering, which was inaugurated by Havana's renown historian, Eusebio Leal, is examining among other topics, the tax systems of Argentina, Mexico, Brazil and Cuba; the influence of mass media on forming a taxpayers' consciousness and general perspectives for taxation. A number of Cuban Ministers and high ranking Customs officials attended the meeting's first session. [c] 1997. Radio Habana Cuba All rights reserved Articles cannot be reproduced, reprinted or published in any system without the consent of RHC. 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