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Venezuela, Cuba ink deals worth $3.2 bln

Sunday, December 13, 2009 HAVANA: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez signed 3.2 billion dollars' worth of cooperation agreements with Cuba and said former Cuban leader Fidel Castro was in great health, after visiting him at his home.Chavez arrived Friday in Havana for a meeting Sunday of the regional ALBA group, and met shortly after landing with President Raul Castro, who took over from his now 83-year-old brother Fidel after the longtime Cuban leader underwent surgery in 2006."Fidel is better than all of us... I told Raul that Fidel will bury us all," Chavez said after his meeting with the Cuban president. Recently there were rumors Fidel Castro was close to dying.Chavez and Raul Castro, 77, on Saturday signed some 285 cooperation agreements worth 3.2 billion dollars, which will go into effect in 2010.Close political partners Cuba and Venezuela have expanded their economic ties since 2000, reaching a cumulative exchange of 8.7 billion dollars, said Chavez' Oil and Energy Minister Rafael Rodriguez, who is also visiting here.The agreements, he said, chiefly cover the health, education, farming and energy sectors.Chavez and Raul Castro will on Sunday attend in Havana a summit of the ALBA, a leftist bloc Chavez founded in 2004 as a counterweight to the US-sponsored Free Trade Area of the Americas.ALBA's nine members include Venezuela, Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Dominica, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Antigua and Barbuda.Chavez also said he would try to convince Fidel Castro to joint the two-day ALBA summit either Sunday or Monday. Fidel Castro has not been seen in public since his July 2006 operation.
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