Castro spoils party as UN squabbles

DAVID USBORNE

New York

Fidel Castro came to the United Nations yesterday dressed like a banker but still roaring like a revolutionary lion. While he did not quite bang the podium with his shoe like Nikita Kruschchev did 35 years ago, he flailed his enemies with his rhetoric, accusing the UN itself of "exalting a new colonialism".

With no fewer than 140 world leaders in New York for the 50th anniversary bash of the UN - the largest such congregation in the history of mankind - the Cuban President shone more brightly and more angrily than any of his peers. But he had one friend among the crush: President Boris Yeltsin, who collided with him at lunch with an extravagant display of comradely greetings.

Not that Mr Castro was the only leader to introduce shards of disharmony to proceedings that had been envisaged as a non-controversial celebration of post-Cold War peace. Mr Yeltsin threw rocks in Nato's direction while almost everyone pointed an accusatory finger at the United States for its part in tipping the UN into near-bankruptcy by failing to pay its dues.

His beard still unkempt and greying, Mr Castro had none the less discarded army fatigues for a double-breasted suit. He also almost honoured the five-minute limit imposed on each leader at the podium, winding up after just seven. (In 1960, he rambled for an agonising four hours.).

The first among the leaders to speak, Mr Clinton did not miss the chance to include a dig at Mr Castro, noting that "throughout this hemisphere, every nation except one has chosen democracy". But Mr Castro dealt a harsh return shot against continuing American sanctions against his country. "We lay claim to a world without ruthless blockades that cause the death of men, women and children, youths and elders, like noiseless atomic bombs."

And in words that will have found sympathy in many small states, Mr Castro made a searing attack on the five permanent members of the Security Council. "The obsolete veto privilege and the ill-use of the Security Council by the powerful are exalting a new colonialism within the UN itself," he said.

In ominous tones, Mr Yeltsin warned of a "new confrontation tomorrow" if Nato was allowed to expand eastwards to include the old European satellites of the former Soviet Union. "This is not the way to build a just world order," he said.

One old trouble-maker, however, offered only sweetness and gratitude yesterday. Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, conceded that 21 years ago he had come before the same assembly as "a fighter for freedom, liberation and independence, carrying with me the torments of my struggling people. Today, however, I come to you with a heart filled with love and peace."

Clinton's warning, page 10