Carter says there is no evidence Cuba transferred technology

Associated Press WriterHAVANA (AP) -- Jimmy Carter said Monday that American officials briefing him for his trip to Cuba said they had no evidence the communist country was transferring abroad technology that could be used to make weapons of mass destruction.

Saying he was raising the issue "with some degree of reluctance," Carter told Cuban President Fidel Castro and this country's top scientists that he had asked White House, State Department and intelligence officials specifically if Cuba was transferring technology that could used in terrorist activities.

"The answer from our experts on intelligence was 'no'," Carter, who arrived in Cuba on Sunday, told a gathering at the country's top biotechnology lab.

"These allegations were made, maybe not coincidentally, just before our visit to Cuba," Carter said of charges last week by Undersecretary of State John Bolton.

In his remarks, Bolton said he believes Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort.

"Cuba has provided dual-use biotechnology to other rogue states," Bolton said at a meeting of the conservative Heritage Foundation, a conservative research group in Washington. "We are concerned that such technology could support BW programs in those states. ... We call on Cuba to cease all BW-applicable cooperation with rogue states and to fully comply with all of its obligations under the Biological Weapons Convention."

Havana has denounced Bolton's allegation as a lie.

Carter, who arrived in Havana on Sunday as the first U.S. head of state in or out of office to visit Cuba since Castro's 1959 revolution, also met at his hotel with two leading Cuban dissidents for a briefing on human rights. The opposition leaders called on Carter to promote dialogue between the two countries.

As Castro sat next to the former American president in an auditorium at the lab, Cuban scientists told Carter that their transfer contracts with other countries forbid the use of Cuban technology for anything other than the vaccines and other lifesaving technology purposes they were designed for.

Answering a question from Carter, Dr. Luis Herrera of the Center of Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology insisted that Cuba monitors the use of technology transferred to other countries to ensure it is not used for terrorism.

"I just want to assure myself," Carter said.

Herrera said that Cuba has no technology transfer program with Iraq, but does have programs with China, Iran, and even some European countries.

Traveling with his wife and a small group of executives and staff from his Carter Center, the former American president had no biotechnology experts in his delegation for the visit to the Center of Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology on the outskirts of Havana. Carter has a science background, but in nuclear technology.

Elizardo Sanchez and Oswaldo Paya, the dissidents who met with Carter, are both coordinators of Project Varela, a proposed referendum asking voters if they want guarantees of individual freedoms, an amnesty for political prisoners, the right to own their business and electoral reforms.

Paya said the men explained the need for dialogue. "Carter understands the concept very well because he is a man of dialogue."

In Washington, a White House spokesman said Monday that Castro should give his own people the same freedom to travel and speak to dissidents that he has given Carter.

"Why have one standard for a visitor and have a far worse, much more repressive standard for his own people?" Ari Fleischer said.

Carter, who did more than any other president to ease tensions with Cuba, arrived Sunday to the strains of "The Star-Spangled Banner." Castro turned to his visitor and said, "It's been a long time since that happened."

Sunday night, a dark-suited Castro threw a dinner for Carter and his delegation at the Palace of the Revolution. The visit gave the Cuban leader a chance to reach out to Americans, and he used it by symbolically throwing open the doors of the island to Carter.

Castro said a Carter speech on Tuesday would be broadcast live. "You can express yourself freely whether or not we agree with part of what you say or with everything you say," Castro said. "You will have free access to every place you want to go."

"We shall not take offense at any contact you may wish to make," he added, an obvious reference to the dissidents and human rights activists Carter plans to meet.

Cuban officials have been irritated with some other foreign leaders who have held similar meetings, but Castro said Carter had proved his sincerity in the past.

"A man who, in the middle of the Cold War and from the depth of an ocean of prejudice, misinformation and distrust ... dared to try to improve relations between both countries deserves respect."

Speaking in Spanish, Carter said he hoped "to discuss ideals that Rosalynn and I hold dear ... peace, human rights, democracy and the alleviation of suffering."

Carter, the first former or sitting president to visit Cuba since Calvin Coolidge came in 1928, has emphasized that this is a private trip and that he will not be negotiating with the Cuban government.

There have been 10 American presidents since Castro took power, and relations were less hostile under Carter than any other.

As president, Carter oversaw the re-establishment of diplomatic exchanges between the two countries and negotiated the release of thousands of political prisoners. He also made it possible for Cuban exiles to visit relatives on the island and, for a short time, for other Americans to travel here freely.

But relations have remained cold. A U.S. trade embargo is still in place and visits by Americans are tightly limited, or are supposed to be: tens of thousands skirt or ignore the travel ban each year.