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NEWS
Posted on Fri, Sep. 26, 2003
Cuba minister
slams U.S. over Iraq war
By RICARDO REIF
Associated Press
UNITED NATIONS - Cuba's foreign minister criticized the U.S.-led war in
Iraq and said Friday the daily attacks on American forces there are
carried out by an occupied people fighting for their "right to
self-determination."
Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque also called the world body
"irrelevant."
Perez Roque, speaking to the 191-member General Assembly, called for
"the end of the occupation in Iraq, the immediate hand-over of the real
control to the United Nations and the commencement of the recovery
process for Iraq's sovereignty."
Cuba and the United States have had hostile relations for more than four
decades. Perez Roque called the near-daily attacks against U.S. soldiers
in Iraq "the reaction of a people that ... begins to fight over the
respect for its right to self-determination."
The United States launched "a war supported by just a few - either by
shortsightedness or by meanness of interests," he said.
Perez Roque denounced Washington's foreign policy, saying "the only
superpower" should recognize that "far from disturbing, it should
contribute to the creation of a peaceful world entitled to both justice
and development for all."
"Those with the most ability to prevent and remove the threats to peace
are the ones causing the war today," he said.
Perez Roque said the United Nations could help fight world problems like
hunger and disease, but instead has become irrelevant.
"We all agree, I think, that the role of the United Nations is
irrelevant today or, at least, is on its way to being so," he said. "But
some of us say so with concern and would like to enhance the
organization. Others say it with covert satisfaction."
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