In the latest hurricane diplomacy news, a Wilma assessment team from the United States won't be heading to Havana after all.

BY FRANCES ROBLES

Plans to send an American post-hurricane assessment team to Cuba have been scrapped after the two sides couldn't agree on what the visitors would do upon arrival in Havana.

After agreeing to a visit by three disaster experts, Cuba wanted the Americans to partake in discussions about regional disaster recovery. The Americans wanted to review Cuba's needs after Hurricane Wilma flooded Havana and the western province, Pinar del Río.

Cuba, the U.S. State Department said, wanted the experts to sit and watch presentations.

Given the impasse, the United States instead will donate $100,000 to independent nongovernmental organizations operating in Cuba. The State Department declined to name them.

''The assessment team offer remains on the table, but we are unwilling to turn a humanitarian mission into a political dialogue on issues not related to providing relief to the Cuban victims of Hurricane Wilma,'' U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said in a statement.

Castro blasted Washington last week, saying Cuba had been clear from the start about what the team would do but that Washington twisted it.

''Immediately, there were cables announcing that Cuba had accepted the aid,'' he said.

The dispute was the latest salvo in a clash over hurricane-related humanitarian aid.

In July, Cuba refused Washington's offer of $50,000 after Hurricane Dennis killed 16 people. Then Washington rebuffed Cuba's proposal to send 1,600 doctors to Louisiana after Katrina hit it.

'We were offering them aid at a time when retired citizens were receiving no assistance and dying in homes, or in hospitals, where chaos prevailed and the cry of `everyone for himself!' reverberated through halls,'' Castro said. ``We wanted to help them.''