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Castro presses Guantanamo return to Cuba

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] Former Cuban President Fidel Castro on Thursday called on US President Barack Obama to turn over control of the Guantanamo Bay military base to Cuba once the detention facility there is closed. In an op-ed published in the online newspaper CubaDebate , Castro wrote that continuing to hold the base would be a violation of international law. Castro scoffed at Obama's pledge to return the base to the country after it instituted a democratic government, and said the move should be made unconditionally. He also criticized the new administration's support of Israel, arguing that the relationship between the US, and that between Israel and the Palestinians were similarly oppressive. The tone of Castro's letter departs from that which he used in a January 22 statement, when he expressed his approval of the new president, while maintaining caution in waiting to see how Obama would address the "insoluble antagonist contradictions of the system." Following Obama's executive order last week that Guantanamo be closed, world leaders hailed the news, but Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Roque issued a call to the US to return Guantanamo completely to the Cuban people.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on January 30, 2009 (boomark / email).