Senior Cuban officials voiced their opposition last night to Washington's plans for housing Taliban and al Qaeda prisoners at a US Navy base at Guantanamo Bay on the communist-run Caribbean island.
"Of course, we don't agree with this, since even though it is occupied by the Americans, this is Cuban territory," said Gen. Ramon Espinosa, head of the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces' eastern section, which includes the Guantanamo area.
Mr Espinosa, in rare comments to reporters, stressed, however, that the proposal to turn the US facility on Cuba's southeast tip into a detention center should not ruffle the military calm on the base's border, which is heavily guarded on both sides.
"We hope to maintain that zone as it is today, pretty quiet on both sides," he said, adding that Cuba aspired to regain control of the area one day by peaceful means. Another senior member of President Fidel Castro's government, Higher Education Minister Fernando Vecino Alegret, also criticized the plan to bring detainees from the conflict in Afghanistan half-way around the world to the century-old base.
"I think it would be yet another mistake by the Americans to use that usurped territory ... I think there will be repudiation of that around the world," Mr Vecino told reporters outside a special session of Cuba's National Assembly parliament.
Cuban Attorney General Juan Escalona scoffed at the proposal as another provocation from the Americans. While condemning the September 11 attacks on the United States, Havana has also opposed the bombardment of Afghanistan, calling it a barbaric massacre of civilians to advance imperial goals.
Castro and his ruling Communist Party have long opposed their political foe's military presence at the 45 square mile base in Guantanamo Bay, calling the installation "a dagger pointed at Cuba's heart".