Russian warships to dock in Cuba for 5 days

PanARMENIAN.Net - A Russian naval task force, led by the Moskva missile cruiser, will dock in Cuba Saturday, Aug 3 for five days, a spokesman for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet said, according to RIA Novosti.

The Moskva, the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet, is accompanied by Udaloy-class destroyer Vice Admiral Kulakov from the Northern Fleet and the Ivan Bubnov tanker.

“The task force will call at the port of Havana on Saturday after a long trans-Atlantic voyage,” Capt. 1st Rank Vyacheslav Trukhachev said on Friday.

The ships will be open for public access and their crews will participate in a number of cultural and sports events, the official said.

Moscow had a military presence in Cuba for almost four decades after the Cuban crisis, maintaining an electronic listening post at Lourdes, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Havana, to monitor U.S. military activity and communications.

Bilateral military cooperation ended abruptly after the surprise closure of Lourdes facility in 2001.

In recent years, however, Russia has moved to revitalize ties with Cuba, as well as other Latin American states.

As part of this effort Moscow has written off most of Havana’s Soviet-era debt, estimated at about $30 billion, and denounced the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba.