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CUBA: OUTPOURING OF AID HELPS CUBA MEND AFTER BRUTAL STORMS
(English IPS News Via Acquire Media NewsEdge)
HAVANA, Sep. 18, 2008 (IPS/GIN) -- For years the Cuban
population has grown more accustomed to giving aid after natural
disasters than to receiving it, but Cubans are now gratefully
looking on as post-hurricane donations pour in from other
countries.
Hurricanes Gustav and Ike caused losses officially estimated at
$5 billion in Cuba.
"Today Cuba is receiving solidarity, which it has so often given
generously itself," said a Cuban state television reporter while
covering the arrival this week of flights from Colombia and
Honduras carrying humanitarian aid to be distributed in the
provinces hit hardest by the storms.
At a press conference Thursday, Foreign Minister Felipe P?rez
Roque described as "admirable" the international community's
response to the difficulties currently faced by Cuba, and reported
that 23 countries have sent donations, whose greatest merit, he
said, is not in their financial value, but in "the attitude they
reflect."
The minister added that United Nations agencies have also been
actively cooperating, working with local authorities. The U.N.
system in Cuba has so far mobilized $3.5 million in aid for the
country's recovery, according to sources from the world body.
The most pressing needs are for food and housing assistance and
materials to restore electricity, P?rez Roque said. He added that
the agriculture sector has sustained severe damages at a time when
the rise in global food prices was already having an impact.
Despite these adverse conditions, and "in the midst of the harsh
U.S. blockade," the country "will pull out of this without
abandoning, above all, those in greatest need," the minister said.
He estimated that Cuba has suffered a total of $224 billion in
economic damages as a result of the five-decade trade embargo,
including nearly $3.8 billion last year alone.
Between Aug. 30 and Sept. 9, hurricanes Gustav and Ike left
seven people dead, dozens injured, thousands of hectares of crops
destroyed, nearly half a million housing units completely or
partially destroyed, and vital infrastructure severely damaged.
"The effects could best be described as devastating, in terms
of infrastructure as well as overall economic impact," said Juan
Diego Ruiz from the Spanish Agency for International Development
Cooperation.
"A great deal of work, efforts and resources of all kinds --
material, human and financial -- will be needed to return to the
pre-hurricane situation in the country," Ruiz said.
Along with emergency aid, which Spain was among the first to
provide, distributing nearly $400,000, the European country has
longer-term proposals in mind, as well.
"In coordination with MINVEC [Cuba's Ministry for Foreign
Investment and Cooperation], we are going to study the situation
so that the various instruments contemplated in the
intergovernmental agreement on cooperation will put a priority in
the medium term on interventions that contribute to recovery from
the effects of the storms," Ruiz said.
The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, which is
engaged in several successful development projects in Cuba, has
also been taking a close look, in coordination with the local
authorities, at the needs and possibilities for assistance.
"The support that we want to offer is medium and long term in
nature, and based on sustainable solutions, specifically in the
areas of housing and roof construction. We also want to analyze the
possibilities in the field of agricultural production," Herbert
Schmid from the Swiss Agency told the press in Cuba.
Beat Schmid, the Oxfam Joint Program Coordinator in Cuba, said
her organization has issued a call for $1 million in aid, of which
some $200,000 has been confirmed.
Oxfam International is involved in some 15 projects in Cuba,
including several in agriculture. "Over the next few weeks, we plan
to visit the areas hit hardest by the hurricanes, mainly so that
people will know that we are there with them," Schmid said.
Shipments of household items, construction materials, medicines
and food began to arrive last week, donated by governments and
gathered by people who want to help or to somehow repay this
Caribbean island nation that for nearly 10 years has trained
doctors for Latin America and other regions in the world free of
charge.
"In this kind of emergency there are no national borders, and
we are cooperating as a show of solidarity from the people of
Colombia to the people of Cuba," the national director of disaster
aid and prevention in Colombia, Luz Amanda Pulido, told the press.
Pulido delivered a shipment of 3,000 corrugated roofing sheets
to Cuba on Monday.
Among the first Latin American nations to provide support were
Ecuador, which sent nine tons of canned tuna through a joint
operation with the World Food Program (WFP), and Brazil, which sent
14.7 tons of food products such as powdered milk, rice and noodles
on Sept. 12.
Brazil's donation was preceded by a telephone call from
President Luiz In?cio Lula da Silva to Cuban President Ra?l Castro
to ask how Brazil could help the Cuban people. After the
conversation, the Brazilian government created an interministerial
group to provide aid to Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Venezuelan President Hugo Ch?vez, a close ally of the Cuban
government, immediately announced that his administration would
send aid to Cuba and other nations hit by the hurricanes. One
hundred tons of powdered milk and 7,500 kilograms of nonperishable
food items collected in a donation drive made up the first
delivery.
The Venezuelan government, which said the donation drive would
continue as long as necessary, also announced the creation of a
brigade of 100 young carpenters, electricians and other workers who
will travel to Cuba to help with the reconstruction work.
And Russia, which headed up the shipments of humanitarian aid
with more than 100 tons of construction materials and tents, among
other items, was discussing with the Cuban authorities this week
the needs created by the disaster and the possible delivery of more
assistance.
The Cuban government has, however, repeatedly rejected offers
of aid from the U.S. government. According to P?rez Roque,
Washington's announcement that it approved permits for $250 million
in sales of food to Cuba and distributed $100,000 in humanitarian
assistance through nongovernmental organizations was a "gross
manipulation" of the facts.
He said the approval of licenses for food sales, for which Cuba
always paid in cash, was merely routine, and added that the Cuban
government had no idea where the $100,000 had been distributed.
Cuba turned down an offer of $5 million in aid from the U.S.,
and instead asked the government to temporarily lift the embargo
so that it could buy construction materials.
Copyright ? 2008 Global Information Network
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