Russian Foreign Ministry: “Guantanamo Base violates Cuban sovereignty”

HAVANA, Cuba, Mar 29 (ACN) In statements to the media, the Secretary of the Russian Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, denounced the U.S.-held Guantanamo naval base as a straight-out theft of Cuban sovereignty of the Antillean nation and pointed out that the military emplacement, which takes 117.6 square kilometers of Cuban territory, is just one of many regular attacks against Latin American independence.

The Guantanamo emplacement—first of its kind outside U.S. borders—became active in December 1903 as a training base for the U.S. Navy. It resulted from an Agreement for the Lease of Lands in Cuba for Coaling and Naval Stations signed on February 23, 1903 between the governments of the United States and Cuba, when the Island’s independence was also encumbered by the Platt Amendment (1901).

After the triumph of the Revolution (1959), the base became a hub of permanent aggression against Cuba and support for U.S.-funded counterrevolutionary organizations and CIA operations, to the point that around 8,288 violations of Cuban airspace and maritime rights have been registered.

In 2002, a detention center was established on site for alleged terrorists, most of them detained in Afghanistan during the U.S. invasion and whose fundamental rights have been relentlessly and continuously violated, according to UN experts.