Castro Blasts U.S. Policy, Calls Base a ‘Concentration Camp’

HAVANA — In a speech here late Wednesday night, Fidel Castro blasted the U.S. decision to intern refugees at the Guantanamo Bay naval base, and said the U.S. trade embargo was the root of the problem.

“We must discuss this affair seriously. To go to the bottom of the problem means putting an end to the blockade,” a translator quoted Castro as saying on CNN, which broadcast the speech live.

Castro said Washington was “creating a concentration camp at Guantanamo Bay.”

Meanwhile, Fernando Remirez de Estenoz Barciela, Cuba’s ambassador to the United Nations, said the policy was devised to pressure Cubans to overthrow Castro and warned that the policy would lead to disaster.

“The U.S. has devised a whole policy . . . to try to choke our country to hunger and allow an internal subversion that would lead to a blood bath, and then how many millions of illegal immigrants will come?” Remirez said.

The moves announced by President Clinton Saturday included stopping cash remittances from relatives in the United States to Cuba, cutting back on charter flights between Havana and Miami and increasing radio broadcasts to Cuba from the United States.