Reagan worries fail to move island leaders

Press, 13 April 1982, Page 9

Reagan worries fail to move island leaders

NZPA-Reuterßridgetown. Barbados

President Reagan ended a working holiday in the Caribbean yesterday during which he outlined his plans to aid the region’s economies and expressed concern about the spread of marxism in the area.

The President and Mrs Reagan attended Easter services in the 109-year-old St James Anglican Church and were to leave for Washington shortly after a meal at the seaside home of the former actress, Claudette Colbert. The President visited Jamaica earlier in the week and held talks with the Prime Minister (Mr Edward Seaga), before flying to Barbados for meetings with other East Caribbean leaders. The discussions centred on Mr Reagan’s SUS3SO million Caribbean Basin initiative, an aid and trade package

aimed at strengthening the economies of the region, American officials said. The leaders heard Mr Reagan describe his proposal as a better alternative to State-controlled systems which, he said, stifled free enterprise.

But the Prime Minister of Barbados (Mr Tom Adams) and Kennedy Simmonds, Prime Minister of St KittsNevis, said the poorer Caribbean Basin nations had special needs which Mr Reagan’s programme could only begin to meet..-

American officials said the Caribbean leaders told the President they needed a direct infusion of dollars to help them build roads and water and power systems, the infrastructure required for them to attract industry. The Caribbean leaders also made it clear in remarks to reporters that they did not share the degree of concern expressed by Mr Reagan

about the emergence of a Marxist-oriented government in the island nation of Grenada.

Mr Reagan said Grenada now bore a Soviet and Cuban trademark and would join Cuba in trying to spread the “virus” of marxism in the region. Mr Adams said he favoured the restoration of democracy in Grenada but said Barbados did not feel threatened by an island whose per capita income was one-fifth that of Barbados. The President also made the second in a series of regular Saturday radio broadcasts during his holiday. While Mr Reagan called for a peaceful solution to the Falklands crisis and stressed the importance of the Caribbean region, calling it the third border of the United States, the broadcast dealt primarily with domestic issues.