(Havana) A Canadian warship, HMCS Margaret Brooke, docked in Cuba on Friday, where two nuclear submarines, one Russian and one American, also arrived this week.
The Canadian ship arrived in the port of Havana in the morning, AFP journalists noted.
This is “the first visit by the Royal Canadian Navy to Havana since 2016,” Canadian Joint Operations Command said on its Facebook page.
This visit, which is scheduled to continue until Monday, marks “recognition of the long-standing bilateral relationship” between the two countries, added the Canadian command.
On Wednesday, the Russian nuclear-powered submarine Kazan arrived in the port of the Cuban capital, accompanied by the frigate Admiral Gorshkov, as well as an oil tanker and a tugboat.
“None of the ships carry nuclear weapons” and they do not represent “a threat to the region,” the Cuban Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (Minfar) indicated last week.
The arrival of this naval battalion some 150 km from the coast of Florida comes against a backdrop of growing tensions between the United States and Russia due to the war in Ukraine.
An American nuclear submarine is also in Cuba, the Pentagon announced Thursday. The nuclear attack submarine USS Helena is in Guantanamo Bay, the US naval base on the island, “as part of a routine visit,” US Southern Command said.
The United States said it was monitoring developments in Cuba, but said the deployment of Russian ships did not pose a direct threat.
During the Cold War, Cuba was the ally of the USSR. The discovery of Soviet missiles in Cuba in 1962 triggered a serious crisis that nearly degenerated into war between the United States and the Soviet Union.
