Havana (dpa) – Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in Cuba Wednesday for a brief visit that is the third stop in his Latin American tour. Ahmadinejad was to meet with Cuban President Raul Castro later Wednesday, after lecturing at the University of Havana. Cuban diplomatic sources in Havana said that Ahmadinejad also has plans to meet with historic Cuban leader Fidel Castro. As he arrived in the communist island in the Caribbean, Ahmadinejad lifted two fingers in a sign of victory. He was coming in from Nicaragua, where he attended Daniel Ortega's inauguration for a further presidential term late Tuesday. At a time of tension in the oil-transport corridor of the Strait of Hormuz, Ahmadinejad's tour of Latin America – which started Sunday in Venezuela and is set to end Thursday in Ecuador – is seen as an effort to side-step growing international tensions and find new markets as the European Union considers an outright embargo on Iranian oil. The US could impose sanctions on foreign countries doing business with Iran's central bank, which would also seriously block the inflow of money for its major export, oil. Over the course of his trip, Ahmadinejad has denied that Iran aims to make a nuclear bomb, a growing concern in the international community which has threatened ever stricter sanctions as Iran defies demands for transparency. Iran's threat to block the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for the sanctions is not the only issue contributing to tensions. On Monday, international nuclear regulators confirmed that Iran has begun enriching uranium at a second enrichment site in Fordo, near Qom. Uranium enrichment is essential to producing weapons-grade material. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/l6Uti Tags: Cuba, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Section: Iran, Latest News, North America
