• Submitted by: admin
• Politics and Government
• 01 / 14 / 2007

Nicaragua's Sandinista President Daniel Ortega on Thursday said his country would resume diplomatic relations with Cuba.

Nicaragua maintained diplomatic relations with Cuba during Ortega's first term from 1979 to 1990, but ties were broken after he left the office.

"We are going to restore commercial and political relations totally and diplomatic with our brother Cuba," Ortega said during an official ceremony to join Venezuela's leftist regional coalition, the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), just a day after he declared his economic allegiance to a US economic treaty.

Cuba and Bolivia are already members of ALBA - devised by Venezuela's outspoken US critic, President Hugo Chavez, as an alternative to US efforts to develop a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA).

While membership in both groups could be contradictory, Ortega appeared to be using his new role as a reformed leftist who has become more moderate in his return to power in the Central American country to smooth over the discrepancy.

Chavez and Cuban President Fidel Castro created ALBA in late 2004, while Bolivia joined the alliance in 2006.

Ortega, who was inaugurated Wednesday, led Nicaragua's Sandinista regime from 1979-90, and now has a second chance to govern the impoverished country, this time in peacetime. His first presidency was marked by a civil war between his Marxist-leaning Sandinista regime and US-sponsored Contra insurgents in which more than 50,000 people died.

Source: Playfuls.com