The President of Costa Rica, Luis Guillermo Solis, expressed in this capital on Monday his country's interest in establishing scientific, technological and human bonds with the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (CIGB), of the BioCubaFarma business group.

Reymil Luis Ferreira Justiniano, Minister of Defense of the Pluri-national State of Bolivia, began today in Havana the first activity of the program of his official visit to Cuba.

The President of Cape Verde, Jorge Carlos de Almeida Fonseca, is expected to arrive in Cuba Monday evening on an official visit.

Costa Rican President Luis Guillermo Solis arrived in Havana on a two-day official visit aimed at deepening relations with Cuba, which were reestablished in 2009 and to promote bilateral trade.

The Cuba-Vietnam cooperation project for rice production, implemented since 2010 to date, has allowed increasing yields to up to 4.58 tons per hectare.

Up next, the press release issued by the Cuban delegation to the negotiations for the reestablishment of direct postal service between Cuba and the United States, as published by the Cubaminrex Web site:

Cuban emigration organizations in Miami that make up the Marti Alliance coalition will march on Saturday, December 12, to demand the immediate lifting of the U.S. economic, financial and commercial blockade against the island.

Cuba reaffirmed on Thursday in Geneva, Switzerland, on the occasion of Human Rights Day, its commitment to the enjoyment of the basic and inalienable rights of all human beings.

Cuban Revolution leader Fidel Castro sent Venezuela´s President Nicolas Maduro a message stressing his brilliant and brave speech on December 6, just after the results of the legislative vote in that country were released.

Deputy Lorena Peña, president of the Legislative Assembly of El Salvador, met on Thursday in this capital with Deputy Esteban Lazo, president of the National Assembly of the People's Power (ANPP), during a visit the legislator of the neighboring country paid to the headquarters of the Cuban Parliament.

Cuba and the United States expressed their willingness to keep on with their bilateral dialog on the expropriations of US property after 1959 and the damage inflicted on the Cuban people by the over-50-year US blockade of the island.

The Sixth Session of the Cuban Parliament´s Eight Legislature will be held December 29, at Havana´s Conventions Palace.

The Cuban population still does not have a clear perception of the economic value of water that is supplied and its annual consumption currently at some 9 billion cubic meters, said Ines Maria Chapman, President of the National Institute of Water Resources (INRH).

Today is Cuba-Caricom Day, a date established at the first joint summit held 2002 in Havana to mark the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Havana and a group of Caribbean nations, which got rid of the colonial rule in the 1970s.

Jasmine Girvan, wife of prominent Jamaican academician, economist and political scientist Norman Girvan received on Monday in this capital, on behalf of her husband, the Friendship Medal given posthumously by the Council of State of the Republic of Cuba.