Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu hosted Cuba’s Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, Gen. Alvaro Lopez Miera, ion Tuesday in what appears to be his first public meeting with a foreign official after the Wagner mercenary group’s boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, led a brief armed rebellion and demanded his dismissal.
The meeting with the Cuban military delegation, reported by Russian state media, is another signal of the two countries’ close relationship amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Shoigu called Cuba its “key alley” in the Caribbean while announcing the two governments were planning to develop “military-technical cooperation projects,” the Russian official news agency Tass reported.
“Cuba has always been and continues to be Russia’s key ally in the region. Our Cuban friends have confirmed their attitude toward our country by demonstrating a complete understanding of the goals of the special military operation in Ukraine,” he said in on-camera remarks released by the Ministry of Defense.
