HAVANA (Reuters) - The top U.S. diplomat in Havana said on Friday Cuba's government was fabricating
a threat of invasion by the United States to instill fear in Cubans and retain political control.

Cuban authorities, concerned Cuba might be the next Iraq, are preparing the armed forces to defend the
island from invasion and have put the island's population of 11 million on the alert with evacuation plans and
 militia training.

 Cuban President Fidel Castro accused the Bush administration in recent speeches of planning to
 assassinate him and invade Cuba to overthrow his communist-run government, in power since 1959.

 "The U.S. government reiterates once again that there is no reason for the U.S. to attack Cuba and that
 the U.S. government has no intention of doing so," the head of the U.S. mission in Havana, James Cason,
 said in a statement.

 "The Cuban government is fabricating the threat of a U.S. military attack to engender fear in the Cuban
 population, to spend scare resources to maintain large military, security and intelligence structures, and
 to justify extreme measures in a vain attempt to crush Cuba's nascent independent civil society," Cason
 said.

 While President Bush has ratcheted up hostile rhetoric against Castro and toughened enforcement of
 trade sanctions and a ban on travel to Cuba, his administration insists it seeks a rapid, but peaceful
 transition to democracy in Cuba.

 Secretary of State Colin Powell said last year Washington did not need to take military action because
 Castro's government was an "anachronism" that would eventually fall of its own weight.

 Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has said the United States has no plans for military action against
 Cuba.

 Cuban authorities take the threat of military intervention seriously and have called meetings of
 neighborhood watch groups to discuss evacuation plans in the event of an invasion.

 Havana residents said they have not felt such a climate of emergency since defense preparations in
 1983, after the United States invaded Grenada during the Reagan administration.

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