HAVANA -- (EFE) -- Cuban Minister of Higher Education Fernando Vecino Alegret
 denied Monday that he had ever been in Vietnam and rejected allegations that he
 had taken part in the torture of U.S. prisoners of war during the Vietnam War.

 ``I would like to visit that sister country, as I have never been there,'' said Vecino
 Alegret, a brigadier general in Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces.

 Ed Hubbard, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel who was a prisoner of war in
 Vietnam in the late 1960s, told The Herald last week that he was virtually certain
 the Cuban minister had taken part in the interrogation and torture of American
 POWs.

 ``They know perfectly well what they are saying is not true,'' Vecino Alegret said,
 adding: ``Do you think I look like a torturer? Look at my face.''