Japan PM planning to pay first-ever visit to Cuba: media

PanARMENIAN.Net - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is considering visiting Cuba next month to strengthen ties and promote Japanese investments there, Kyodo news agency reported on Thursday, August 18, but the foreign ministry said no such plan was being made, Reuters reports.

The trip, if confirmed, will coincide with Abe's planned attendance at the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York, Kyodo said. It would be the first ever visit to Cuba by a Japanese prime minister. "There is no such fact. That is all I can say," an official at the foreign ministry's Latin American and Caribbean Affairs division said, referring to the Kyodo report.

Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida visited Cuba last year and met President Raul Castro. Kishida's trip followed a surprise announcement by Castro and U.S. President Barack Obama that the former adversaries would normalise ties.