Release Is Expected Today-Ambassador Says That Base Will Be Neutral

14 Others Also Sought

Negotiation Reported Begun for Return of Seized Employees of Mine

Special to The New York Times

HAVANA, June 29-Officers of the United States Navy base at Guantanamo Bay were reported today to have made contact with Cuban rebels to arrange for the release of twenty-eight Navy and Marine personnel kidnaped Friday near the base.

A United States Embassy spokesman said, information relayed from the rebels hinted that the men would be released tomorrow.

The kidnaping was laid to the insurgents operating in Oriente Province who on Thursday night carried off ten Americans and two Canadians employed by the Moa Bay Mining Company. [Two other North American civilians were seized in other places, The Associated Press reported.]

The rebels said they were retaliating against the United States for having given military assistance to the forces of President Fulgencio Batista. General Batista has been attempting to eliminate the rebels, headed by Fidel Castro, for some months.

Aid to Batista Denied

The United States Ambassador, Earl E. T. Smith, said in a statement that, “in compliance with the United States policy of nonintervention in Cuban internal affairs, the base has not-and will not-refuel or in other ways service the Cuban military aircraft engaged in combat activity.”

Mr. Smith noted that Guantanamo facilities were “available to all aircraft in distress or on official visits to the base.” The base is in Oriente Province.

Twenty-seven Navy personnel, mostly marines were kidnaped Friday night while riding in a bus between the town of Guantanamo and the small port of Caimanera, where the base personnel embark for their station across the bay.

The driver and conductor of the bus, both Cubans, also are missing.

Last night one Navy enlisted man was kidnaped as he and his companion were walking on the road near Caimanera. A group of rebels seized the two, but permitted the serviceman’s companion to return to the base.

The Embassy spokesman said that the naval authorities at Guantanamo had been informed by the enlisted man who was released last night that “the naval personnel captured day before yesterday and your companion will be released three days from the time of their capture.” That means tomorrow.
 
The Embassy spokesman said that the Consul, Park Fields Wollam, was in contact in the mountains of northern Oriente Province with the rebel band that kidnaped the twelve technical and supervisory employees from the mining company property.

Mr. Wollam reported that all the men “are well and are being treated well.”

The second secretary of the United States Embassy here, William G. Bowdier, has been sent to Oriente Province to aid in communications with Havana. He went this morning to Moa Bay, which is on the province’s north coast. From there he will fly to the Guantanamo base and then to Santiago de Cuba, capital of Oriente Province, to report to the United States Embassy in Havana.

Communications between Havana and Moa Bay are difficult since there is no telephone line.

Cuban Army Chiefs Active

Lieut. Gen. Pedro Rodriguez Avila, Chief of Staff of the Cuban Army, expressed confidence that the mining men would be returned immediately. He made this statement following a conference called be President Batista at the Presidential Palace early this morning. Gen. Eulogio Cantillo, in charge of operations against the rebels in Oriente Province, flew to Havana for the conference.

General Rodriguez Avila went on to say that perhaps the mining men were being held as hostages to prevent the army from attacking. He said the kidnaping by the rebels might be an attempt to draw the armed forces away from the Sierra Maestra, where the army has had the main group of rebels “isolated and fleeing for the past month.”

The general said that the army was liberating many zones in Oriente Province of rebels and that many were surrendering.

The rebels who kidnaped the mining men were led by Raul Castro, brother of Fidel Castro, rebel leader, whose stronghold is in the Sierra Maestra.

It was reported that the sane night the Americans and Canadians were kidnaped from the Moa Bay mining project another group of rebels entered the property of the near-by Nicaro Nickel plant, owned by the United State’s Government, and carried off two tractors and five trucks.

The Sierra Cristal Mountains, where the ten Americans and two Canadians are being held by the rebels, are rocky, with scanty vegetation. The rebel band, believed to number several hundred, is said to have been operating in these mountains for several weeks.