China has reached a secret deal with Cuba to establish an electronic eavesdropping facility on the island roughly 100 miles (160km) from Florida, the Wall Street Journal has reported, but the US and Cuban governments cast strong doubt on the report.
Such a spy installation would allow Beijing to gather electronic communications from the south-eastern United States, which houses many US military bases, as well as to monitor ship traffic, the newspaper reported.
The US Central Command headquarters is based in Tampa. Fort Liberty, formerly Fort Bragg, the largest US military base, is based in North Carolina.
The countries have reached an agreement in principle, the officials said, with China to pay Cuba “several billion dollars” to allow the eavesdropping station, according to the Journal.
“We have seen the report. It’s not accurate,” John Kirby, spokesperson for the White House national security council, told Reuters. But he did not specify what he thought was incorrect.
He said the United States has had “real concerns” about China’s relationship with Cuba and was closely monitoring it.
Brig Gen Patrick Ryder, a US defense department spokesperson, said: “We are not aware of China and Cuba developing a new type of spy station.”
In Havana, the Cuban vice-foreign minister, Carlos Fernández de Cossio, dismissed the report as “totally mendacious and unfounded”, calling it a US. fabrication meant to justify Washington’s decades-old economic embargo against the island. He said Cuba rejects all foreign military presence in Latin America and the Caribbean.
A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington said: “We are not aware of the case and as a result we can’t give a comment right now.” The Cuban embassy did not respond to a request for comment.
The reported deal comes as Washington and Beijing are taking tentative steps to soothe tensions that spiked after a suspected Chinese high-altitude spy balloon crossed the United States before the US military shot it down off the east coast in February.
It could also raise questions about a trip to China that US officials say the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, is planning in coming weeks. Washington’s top diplomat had earlier scrapped a visit over the spy balloon incident.
The Biden administration has pushed to boost engagement with China even as ties have deterior
