Cuba's Nuclear Power Program and Post-Cold War Pressures

Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado and Alexander Belkin CUBA'S NUCLEAR POWER PROGRAM AND POST-COLD WAR PRESSURES by Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado and Alexander Belkin1 Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado is a graduate student in the Ph.D. program of the University of Georgia's Political Science Department and a Research Assistant at its Center for East-West Trade Policy. Alexander Belkin is a Researcher at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO). t the closing session of the Rights, clearly captured the importance regime of Fidel Castro appeared to have Cuban National Assembly on of the issue when he stated, "Nuclear cleared the last hurdle in its 10-year AJuly 6, 1993, Fidel Castro energy is a must. It is not impossible. quest for nuclear ascendancy. The stated, "we are really facing a very, very We will complete it with the Russians nuclear power reactors were to be the great challenge. We have to be ready or other sources (...)." He concluded, crowning achievement of the Cuban for greater difficulties than we can imag- "for the time being it is only delayed."6 revolution. Indeed, the Cubans claimed ine."2 This stark assessment of Cuba's In September 1993, Moscow ad- that the first reactor in Juragua was more economy is based on the fact that oil vanced $30 million to Cuba to moth- than three-fourths complete.8 Cuba imports and international trade have ball the Juragua project in the needed only to negotiate payment of $21 declined to half their previous levels, Cienfuegos province, where two 440- million to the German firm Siemens AG resulting in a severe energy crisis as VVER reactors sit nearly completed.7 for the installation of instrumentation well as shortages of food, medicine, and This ends, at least for the time being, and control facilities at Juragua-1 to most other goods. Of all the issues speculation over the nuclear safety and reach its goal. The agreement was all confronting Cuba in the now two-year- proliferation concerns surrounding the but forgotten in the September 1992 old "special period,"3 energy has Cuban nuclear program. Given the "State of the Revolution" address, when emerged as the most daunting. How stop-and-go nature of the project in the Fidel Castro proclaimed that Cuba was can Cuban government justify its enor- past three years and Cuban overtures to temporarily suspending construction of mous capital outlays in the pursuit of the nonproliferation community, this the nuclear power reactor at Juragua. nuclear energy while most Cubans have temporary lull in the project presents In announcing his bitter and painful been reduced to rations of one piece of an opportunity to assiduously address decision at that time, Castro blamed the bread daily?4 The answer is that only these issues. Russians for demanding $200 million a reliable source of energy can get Cuba While this announcement could be for continued work on the project. Yet, back on its feet again and allow it to viewed as a death knell of sorts for on November 4, 1992, Russian and feed its people. That source, in the Cuban nuclear power aspirations, Cuba Cuban officials announced that they had absence of a steady flow of imported has had to clear a number of hurdles agreed to resume the long-stalled con- oil, may well be nuclear energy.5 over the past several years to reach this struction of Cuba's nuclear power plant Miguel Alfonso, a professor of Interna- point. When Russian officials agreed with French assistance. Although this tional Relations at the University of in April 1992 to continue funding for agreement called for resuming construc- Havana and Cuba's representative to the the construction of two VVER-model tion at the Juragua site, no concrete United Nations Commission on Human reactors in Cienfuegos province, the plans have ever been detailed. 18 The Nonproliferation Review/Winter 1994 Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado and Alexander Belkin Moreover, now that Russia has ad- should increase cooperation on the most ment). It has repeatedly put forward vanced $30 million to mothball the re- pressing issue related to Cuba's nuclear conditions for its accession to the treaty, actor site at Juragua, the United States program, that of nuclear safety. The including the cessation of persistent and the nonproliferation community potential safety hazards at Juragua surely hostility from the United States, a U.S. have new opportunities for cooperation concern Cuba's leadership, which has pledge to renounce the use of military with Cuba. Such cooperation would not rejected safety assistance from the force against Cuba, and the end of port be timely because of the recent move of United States and the international com- visits of U.S. ships equipped with Cuba towards a broader endorsement munity in the past. In fact, if economic nuclear weapons to the U.S. Naval Base of nonproliferation goals. A letter from considerations are the main factors pre- at Guantanamo Bay. Secretary of State Warren Christopher venting safe completion or completion Before the Soviet break-up, Cuba's to U.S. Senator Connie Mack stated: at all of the reactor, Cuba may welcome generally negative attitude towards non- "The Russian government, which is this type of aid. By providing assis- proliferation had the effect of undermin- fully aware of our non-proliferation and tance in this area, the United States and ing the credibility of the Soviet posi- safety concerns about the Juragua plant, the international community can estab- tion on these issues. In fact, after 1968, has concluded that completion of the lish contacts with Cuba that may fur- Cuba's unyielding stance on nonprolif- project is not feasible under present cir- ther influence its attitude toward non- eration was the only apple of discord in cumstances."9 This cooperation could proliferation. In summary, the United the generally amicable Cuban-Soviet serve to eliminate safety concerns about States should use this window of op- relationship. Cuba's intransigence the construction at Juragua, and also portunity to see that Cuba's nuclear aroused suspicion. This behavior, along eliminate proliferation fears concerning program, long feared as both a prolif- with the questionable economic value a possible weapons program surround- eration and safety concern, becomes of the nuclear energy program, was in- ing Cuba's power program. neither. terpreted by those in the anti-Castro It is important to note that shortly To provide a basis for considering community as an indication of the pos- before Castro's announcement on the these opportunities, this focused case sibility of another, more nefarious, ra- suspension, Cuba declared at the Au- study examines the history of Cuba's tionale behind the Cuban program. At gust 1992 Organizacion por la nuclear program. This analysis includes the end of the 1980s, rumors about a Prohibicion de Armas Nucleares en current and future proliferation devel- secret weapons program were magni- America Latina (OPANAL)10 meeting opments, the political and economic mo- fied in a series of denouncements of the in Mexico City that it would join Ar- tivations for pursuing nuclear power, the nuclear program made by knowledge- gentina, Brazil, and Chile in signing the difficulties faced in continuing construc- able and seemingly trustworthy Cuban newly-amended Treaty for the Prohibi- tion, and the nuclear safety questions defectors.12 There has been little evi- tion of Nuclear Weapons in Latin surrounding the project. dence to support these claims, but the America (Treaty of Tlatelolco). The Congressional hearings in July 1991 new amendments would, in effect, place NONPROLIFERATION CONCERNS before the Committee on Energy and the nuclear facilities of all signatories the Environment as well as an October under full-scope international safe- Cuba has never had a positive non- 1992 General Accounting Office (GAO) guards.11 These changes to the regional proliferation record. Since the first days study of the issue highlight the signifi- agreement suggest two catalysts for of the nonproliferation regime, it has cance of these concerns. The current Cuba's action: the nonproliferation strongly opposed the efforts of the in- state of Cuban nuclear activities has regime's strengthening resolve to con- ternational community to curb the provided little evidence of a weapons dition nuclear exports to non-signato- spread of weapons of mass destruction. programs. This conclusion is buttressed ries of the Non-Proliferation Treaty The Havana government was one of only by experts in the field who consistently (NPT) on acceptance of full-scope safe- four countries in the United Nations refer to "Cuba's inability to develop guards and Russia's inability to act as a General Assembly to vote against the nuclear weapons."13 reliable, sole-source provider of capital resolution endorsing the NPT in June At the insistence of the Soviets, and technology. 1968. Furthermore, Cuba is now the Cuba signed three safeguards agree- Because of Cuba's positive move- only major Latin American state that ments with the International Atomic En- ment on the issue, the world commu- has neither signed nor ratified the Treaty ergy Agency (IAEA), which currently nity and particularly the United States of Tlatelolco (despite its 1992 announce- apply to all nuclear facilities, including The Nonproliferation Review/Winter 1994 19 Jonathan Benjamin-Alvarado and Alexander Belkin nuclear power plants, a nuclear research Academy of Sciences in Havana. Nine POLITICAL IMPERATIVES reactor, and a zero-power nuclear reac- months later Granma and Pravda

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