HAVANA (Reuters):
COMMUNIST CUBA defended Iran's nuclear energy programme yesterday and rejected efforts by what it called United States "imperialism" and by other Western powers to halt uranium enrichment by the Islamic nation.
The endorsement came during a visit by Iranian Parliament Speaker Gholamali Haddadadel to cement political ties between Havana and Tehran, which both have a hostile relationship with Washington.
"Nobody has the right to deny any nation the option of nuclear energy for peaceful use," the president of the Cuban National Assembly, Ricardo Alarcon, said in a greeting.
"What the world should fight is the monopoly that some have over weapons of mass destruction and, in particular, nuclear arms," Alarcon said.
"That specially applies to the only country in history that has employed those weapons against a civilian population," he said in reference to the U.S. bombings of Japanese cities toward the end of World War II.
Iran, branded as part of an "axis of evil" by Washington, has resisted international pressure to halt uranium enrichment which the West fears could be used to develop nuclear weapons. Tehran says it wants a peaceful nuclear energy program.
Iran confirmed on Tuesday it had begun enrichment work after the International Atomic Energy Agency ruled it would report Tehran to the U.N. Security Council for possible action over its nuclear program.
Haddadadel's first stop in Cuba was a visit to Havana's Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology for a briefing on Cuba's advanced pharmaceutical development program.
The Bush administration in 2002 accused Cuba of developing biological weapons capability and exporting dual-use technology to Iran. Havana insists its $1 billion biotech industry is dedicated to producing medicine, such as the world's only vaccine against meningitis B.
Cuba has exported technology to Iran since 1994 and an industrial plant built on the outskirts of Tehran with Cuban know-how produces interferon and hepatitis B vaccines.
The Iranian leader arrived in Cuba on Wednesday night from Venezuela, which along with Cuba and Syria were the only countries at the IAEA to vote against the U.N. watchdog's decision to send the Iran nuclear energy dispute to the U.N. Security Council, which could impose sanctions.
U.S. hostility has brought Cuba and Iran, one a Marxist state and the other an Islamic republic, closer in the last decade.
Cuban President Fidel Castro visited Tehran in 2001 and Cuba has invited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to attend the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Havana in September.
Alarcon told Haddadadel their countries should stick together in the face of U.S. "aggression."
"We are in the front line against imperialism and must continue helping each other," Alarcon said.
2006-02-16 17:37:59 GMT (Reuters)
