Vietnam and Cuba cement ties with trade agreement
HAVANA - Vietnam signed agreements on Tuesday to sell Cuba more than 150,000 tonnes of rice next year on easy payment terms, officials said.
The two communist-run countries also signed agreements to avoid double taxation and to prevent tax evasion.
Vietnam, which faced American trade sanctions until 1994, has been a staunch supporter of Cuba's efforts to overcome a four-decade-old U.S. trade embargo.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union plunged Cuba into a severe economic crisis a decade ago, Vietnam has become a major supplier of rice, a main staple in the Cuban diet.
Under a two-year-old easing of the U.S. trade embargo, Cuba late last year started buying rice from the United States, its traditional supplier before Castro's 1959 revolution.
Cuba will get interest-free credit from the Vietnamese government, and have 450 days to pay for the first 100,000 tonnes of rice and 540 days for the next 50,000 tonnes, a joint statement said.
In a second contract, Vietnam agreed to sell additional unspecified quantities of rice with private financing at market rates, but with the same long-term payment terms, the statement said.
The deals were signed during a visit to Cuba by Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, who met with Cuban President Fidel Castro to cement political ties between the two states.
Cuba bought 250,000 tonnes of rice from Vietnam this year, the spokeswoman said, equivalent to more than half Cuba's rice imports. Most of the rest came from China.
A delegation of 37 Vietnamese businessmen that accompanied Khai were looking for opportunities to expand trade with Cuba, including the possibility of exporting tea, textiles and shoes,
Vietnamese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Phan Thvy Thanh told Reuters.
Vietnam donated 300 computers and 100 printers to Cuba on Tuesday as a gesture of gratitude for Cuban support during the Vietnam War, when Havana sent doctors, medicine and blood to North Vietnam.
Reuters - October 29, 2002
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