Havana - With controversy swirling around the cost of AIDS drugs, President Fidel Castro and visiting South African President Thabo Mbeki focused Tuesday on Cuba's patent-busting offer to help the African nation develop its own medications.
Mbeki, on his second day of a four-day official visit to Havana, was welcomed to the Plaza de la Bandera (Flag Square) just outside the Palace of the Revolution for lengthy talks on Castro's offer and a range of pending cooperation agreements.
Last week, Castro touted Cuba's development of world-class AIDS drugs and said "we will fully support Brazil and South Africa, encouraging them to ignore US patents and produce the drugs to save the millions of lives that can be saved."
Cuba "is producing those famous (antiretroviral) cocktails," Castro told local television March 18, challenging multinational pharmaceutical companies to protest. "I would like to hear a protest so I could grin from ear to ear," he said.
South Africa faces an AIDS epidemic with some 4.7 million South Africans -- one in nine -- infected with HIV, the virus which causes AIDS, according to a government study.
The South African government is waging a landmark court battle with 39 large pharmaceutical countries to facilitate access to cheap medicine.
In Johannesburg Tuesday, health ministers from the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) adopted two declarations, to support the South African government in its legal fight, and to recognize the right of poor countries to access cheap medicines, including treatment for people living with HIV/AIDS.
Options which should be available to the world's poorest countries should include parallel importation of medicines and compulsory licensing, allowing countries to import brand-name drugs from other countries where they are sold at lower prices and to issue licenses to produce cheaper versions of patented drugs.
Delegates from 33 countries and 20 health ministers, including those from of Angola, Botswana, Cambodia, Iran, Nigeria, Indonesia, Cuba, South Africa and India -- the last two having the largest number of HIV carriers in the world, adopted the declarations.
Pharmaceutical companies argue both strategies compromise patent rights.
Shortly after his arrival in Havana Monday, Mbeki took a more than two-hour tour with Castro of Cuba's Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology Center, hub of the country's pharmaceuticals industry which is gradually becoming an export business for Havana.
South Africa also is in the process of obtaining several Cuban-made vaccines including one for hepatitis B.
Mbeki was due to give an address on Africa at the University of Havana Tuesday, and unveil a bust of African National Congress trailblazer Oliver Tambo before heading Thursday to the resort city of Varadero east of here for a visit to petrochemical facilities.
He also was expected to sign cooperation agreements in areas including science, technology, culture and sports.
South Africa has invested in Cuba's mining sector and is considering investing in the petrochemical and sugar industries.
Cuba gave strong support to Mbeki's African National Congress during the anti-apartheid struggle when the now-ruling party fought to overthrow white minority rule, and the two countries have maintained a close relationship since then.
Cuba has more than 400 doctors working in the South African public health system to alleviate a shortage of doctors in rural areas, and about 200 South Africans are studying at Cuban medical schools.