Maxim Oreshkin, Economy Advisor to the Russian Presidency, met this Tuesday with Joaquín Alonso Vázquez, Minister-President of the Central Bank of Cuba (BCC), as part of his visit to Havana.
BCC first vice president Francisco Mayobre, as well as Alberto Javier Quiñones and Yamile Berra Cires, vice presidents of that financial institution, also attended that meeting on the Cuban side.
Previously, Oreshkin attended the inauguration of the working meeting of Russia and Cuba at the Havana Club, also chaired by Ricardo Cabrisas Ruiz, Cuban Deputy Prime Minister and head of Foreign Trade and Investment (MINCEX).
Speaking at the plenary, Cabrisas Ruiz denounced that the inclusion of Cuba in Washington’s list of countries supposedly sponsoring terrorism, significantly harms the international ties of the banking and financial sector.
“More than 100 banks from different regions of the world suspended operations and correspondents with the Cuban banking system, as a result of being included in that unilateral list, which creates delays to execute collections and payments with foreign partners,” he explained.
After the official interventions, the Cuban delegation presented facilities to promote Russian investment in the country.
Preceded by a private dialogue between Cabrisas Ruiz and Oreshkin, Ana Teresita González Fraga, MINCEX first deputy minister, and Carlos Jorge Méndez, general director of Foreign Investment, also participated in the working meeting on the Cuban side. Also present were Maritza Cruz García, Vice Minister of Finance and Prices, and Julio García Pérez, president of the AZCUBA company.
Also attending for Russia were Viktor Koronelli, ambassador to Cuba; Svetlana Lukash, deputy head of the Directorate of Experts of the presidency, and Denis Agafonov, deputy head for Foreign Policy of the Office of the presidency.
In the plenary were the Russian Deputy Minister of Finance Aleksei Lavrov and the Deputy Minister of Agriculture Ivan Lebedev, among others.
