“U.S. Seeks O.A.S. Action On Cuba”

Press, Volume C, Issue 29499, 28 April 1961, Page 13

“U.S. Seeks O.A.S. Action On Cuba”

(A.Z F'cw AssuciatioTL—AJopynuntt NEW YORK, April 27. United States Ambassadors in Latin America had been instructed to sound out the various Governments on taking collective action against Cuba and Communist subversion in the hemisphere, the “New York Times” said today. The newspaper’s Washington correspondent said that the United States State Department began yesterday to call in Latin American Ambassadors singly to inform them of the instructions to United States missions and to acquaint them with the thinking of the Kennedy Administration.

According to informed sources in Washington. the Administration would like as soon as possible a meeting of “the organ of consultation" of the Organisation of American States, provided there was assurance beforehand of the necessary two-thirds approval of positive measures. The “organ of consultation” was a gathering of the Foreign Ministers.' and was the supreme body of the inter-Ameriean system. The correspondent said the Kennedy Administration did not want such a meeting on the Cuban problem if it was likely to reveal divisions and produce meaningless resolutions of tepid censure. What the Administration had in mind, according to authoritative, sources, was. first, that the American States should sever diplomatic and commercial relations with the Government of Dr. Fidel Castro, the Cuban Prime Minister.

Although Latin American trade with Cuba was almost negligible, the Administration believed such joint action would have a psychological impact far transcending its economic effect. But the Administration wanted to go beyond the condemnation and isolation of Cuba. The real threat, as President Kennedy said last week in his address to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, was that Cuba had become “a base for subverting the survival of other free nations throughout the hemisphere.” the “New York Times” correspondent said. In Miami, a correspondent of the “New York Times” said there was • speculation that the intensive propaganda build-up for the May Day celebration in Havana might presage a formal proclamation of Cuba as a people’s republic, with the Communist Party becoming officially recognised as the party of the revolution.