Venezuela Socialist Party Deputy Meets Cuba’s Castro in Show of Unity

By Staff, Agencies

Venezuela’s ruling Socialist Party Vice President Diosdado Cabello met with Cuban Communist Party chief Raul Castro on Friday in Havana in a show of unity as the United States steps up pressure on the governments of the allied nations.

In a news conference at the Havana airport, Cabello said they had discussed preparations for the Sao Paulo forum of leftist Latin American and Caribbean groups in Caracas next month and how to better integrate their two nations.

Cuba’s President Miguel Diaz-Canel and Cuban Communist Party deputy leader Jose Ramon Machado Ventura took part in the meeting with Cabello, who had earlier on his two-day trip to Havana also met separately with Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez.

“We need to be united because we have a very powerful enemy in common,” Cabello told reporters.

Cuban state-run media said that Castro had “reiterated Cuba’s firm support to the Venezuelan people and government”.

This week, Washington tightened its decades-old embargo on Cuba by imposing heavier travel restrictions in what it said was a bid to pressure the country over its involvement in Venezuela.

Meanwhile, the Lima Group regional bloc of 12 nations has taken a different tack of late and is courting Cuba to help find a solution to the political and economic crisis in Venezuela.

Cuba, which has been a key backer of the Venezuelan government since the leftist Bolivarian Revolution that began under former president Hugo Chavez in 1998, has said it is open to help mediate but will never betray its ally.