Cuba offers unconditional support for Venezuela in conflict with US

Havana, March 10 (IANS/EFE) Cuba gave its "unconditional support" to Venezuela on Tuesday following Washington's declaration of a "national emergency" due to the "extraordinary risk" that the situation in Venezuela signifies for the security of the US.

"No one has the right to intervene in the internal affairs of a sovereign state nor to declare it, without any basis, a threat to its national secruity," the government said in a statement posted on the web page of Communist Party daily Granma.

Raul Castro's government described as "arbitrary and aggressive" the order issued by US President Barack Obama, which he considers a "reprisal for the measures adopted (by Venezuela) in defence of its sovereignty against the interference of government authorities and of the United States Congress."

President Nicolas Maduro asked Venezuela's parliament for special powers to defend "the integrity" of the nation as a result of the US statement, which has also imposed new sanctions on high-ranking government officials for alleged human rights violations.

"How does Venezuela threaten the United States? At a distance of thousands of kilometers, without strategic weapons and without using resources or staff to conspire against the constitutional order of the United States, the statement does not sound very believable and exposes the purpose of those who make it," the note said.

Separately, retired Cuban leader Fidel Castro congratulated Maduro for his "brilliant and courageous" speech against the "brutal plans" of the US against his country.

"Dear Nicolas Maduro, president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela: I congratulate you for your brilliant and courageous speech against the brutal plans of the United States government," the 88-year-old Fidel said in a note dated Monday night.

"Your words will go down in history as proof that humanity can and should know the truth," the Cuban leader said in reference to the speech given by Maduro on Monday from the Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas.

--IANS/EFE

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