HAVANA - The US naval base in Guantanamo is a permanent threat to the people of Latin America, President of the World Peace Council (WPC) Maria do Socorro said Monday.

The facility is illegal and has been there since 1903 against the wishes of the Cuban people, Socorro said at a seminar held in the city of Guantanamo in the eastern part of the island nation.

Describing foreign military bases as "control tools", Socorro said Latin American countries should pay close attention to the US enclave in Guantanamo as the United States is "still trying to turn Latin America into its back yard" against the trend of the times.

In her opinion, US proposals such as the Pan-Americanism and the Alliance for Progress, among others, are all intended to help achieve US strategic goals.

Socorro also called upon the event's participants to denounce the US policy and to demand the occupied territory in Guantanamo be returned to Cuba. She also called for an end to the US trade embargo against Cuba.

The prison within the military base has become a center for torture where the lives of alleged terrorists are threatened, she said.