A few hours after accomplishing that mission in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad, home to the most prestigious military academy of that country as well as important combat units, the White House offered the world’s public opinion a carefully drafted version about the death of Osama Bin Laden, the chief of Al Qaeda.

Of course, the world and the international media focused their attention on the issue, thus pushing all other public news into the background.

The US TV networks broadcast the President’s carefully drafted speech and showed images of the public’s reaction.

It was obvious that the world realized how sensitive the matter was. Pakistan is a country of 171 841 000 inhabitants –where the US and NATO have been carrying out a devastating war for ten years now- that has nuclear weapons and is a traditional ally of the United States.

There is no doubt that this Muslim country can not agree with the bloody war that the United States and its allies are waging against Afghanistan, another Muslim country with which it shares the troublesome and mountainous border traced by the British colonial empire. Common tribes live on both sides of the demarcation line.

The American press itself understood that the President was concealing almost the entire information.

The western news agencies –ANSA, AFP, AP, REUTERS and EFE- the press and important websites have published interesting reports about the incident.

The New York Times asserts that facts differed greatly from the official version announced on Tuesday by the White House and top intelligence officials, according to which Bin Laden’s death –who they finally recognized was unarmed, although they said he ‘resisted’- had occurred in the middle of an intense gun battle.

But, according to the New York daily, “the raid, though chaotic and bloody, was extremely one-sided, with a force of more than 20 Navy SEAL members quickly dispatching the handful of men protecting Bin Laden.”

The New York Times states that “the only shots fired by those in the compound came at the beginning of the operation, exactly when Bin Laden’s trusted courier, Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, opened fire from behind the door of the guesthouse adjacent to the house where Bin Laden was hiding.”

“After the SEAL members shot and killed Mr. Kuwaiti and a woman in the guesthouse, the Americans were never fired upon again”, the newspaper states based on reports from said sources, whose identity was not revealed….

On Tuesday, the White House spokesman, Jay Carney, in an account of events, had asserted that in the early hours of Monday morning, the US commando “were engaged in a firefight throughout the operation.”

Leon E. Panetta, the director of the C.I.A., said, “there were some firefights that were going on” as these US elite military were clearing the upper floors of the residential compound where Bin Laden was hiding.

However, the newspaper asserts that, although Bin Laden had not raised any weapon when he was gunned down, the commandos that found him in one of the rooms “saw Osama bin Laden with an AK-47 and a Makarov pistol in arm’s reach.”

Today, May 6, news continue to pour in.

From Washington, one of the agencies reports that a sole gunman had shot against the US forces. It continues to report that, on Sunday evening, “several helicopters ferry 79 commandos towards Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, north of Islamabad, flying low to avoid detection by radar, as Pakistan has not been told of the raid in advance.

“Two helicopters deliver more than 20 US Navy SEALs to the residence, which has four-to-six meter walls covered with barbed wire. One of the choppers, a MH-60 Blackhawk apparently modified to evade radar, is out of commission due to “mechanical failure,” according to initial reports from US officials.

“One group of commandos moves toward a smaller guest house next to the compound’s main building. Bin Laden’s trusted courier opens fire and is shot and killed, along with his wife.

The courier is the only man at the compound who fires on the Americans, contrary to earlier accounts from the White House that described a firefight throughout the nearly 40-minute operation.

“…Another US special forces team enters the main three-story house.”

“… They encounter the courier’s brother…who was shot and killed”, according to a US official who offered no further details. According to NBC news, the man “has one hand behind his back” when the team entered the room, “causing the SEALs to suspect he may have a gun, which turns out not to be the case.

“The commandos move up the stairs and in one of the rooms meet up with Bin Laden’s adult son, Khalid, who is also killed…”

“On the top floor, they find Bin Laden and his wife in the bedroom. She reportedly tries to move between her husband and the commandos, and is shot in the leg. Bin Laden, who gives no signal of surrender, is shot in the head, and some media say he is also struck in the chest. Earlier versions of the raid said Bin Laden “resisted” and that he had used his wife as a human shield, but the White House later acknowledges those details are incorrect.

“President Barack Obama, following events from the White House, is told the SEALs have tentatively identified Bin Laden. A Time magazine report, based on an interview with CIA Director Leon Panetta, suggests Bin Laden was killed less than 25 minutes into the raid.

-“In Bin Laden’s room, the US team finds an AK-47 assault rifle and a 9 mm Russian pistol. Other weapons are discovered in the compound, but no further details are given.

“The special forces find cash and telephone numbers sown into Bin Laden’s clothing…”

“The Navy SEALs hauled away everything that could offer a lead to further information: note pads, the five computers, 10 hard drives and more than 100 storage devices (CDs, DVDs, USB).

“…The U.S. team destroys the downed helicopter after moving the women and children in the compound to a safe area.

“…Thirty eight minutes after the start of the raid, U.S. helicopters fly away, carrying away the corpse of Bin Laden.”

The AP published information of political and also human interest:

“One of three wives living with Osama Bin Laden told Pakistani interrogators she had been staying in the Al-Qaeda chief’s hideout for five years, and could be a key source of information about how he avoided capture for so long, a Pakistani intelligence official said Friday.”

“Bin Laden’s wife, identified as Yemeni-born Amal Ahmed Abdullfattah, said she never left the upper floors of the house the entire time she was there.

“She and Bin Laden’s other two wives are being interrogated in Pakistan after they were taken into custody following Monday’s American raid on Bin Laden’s compound in the town of Abbottabad. Pakistani authorities are also holding eight or nine children who were found there after the U.S. commandos left.

“Given shifting and incomplete accounts from U.S. officials about what happened during the raid, testimony from Bin Laden’s wives may be significant in unveiling details about the operation.

“Their accounts could also help show how Bin Laden spent his time and managed to stay hidden, living in a large house close to a military academy in a garrison town, a two-and-a-half hours’ drive from the capital, Islamabad.

“The Pakistani official said CIA officers had not been given access to the women in custody.”

“The proximity of Bin Laden’s hideout to the military garrison and the Pakistani capital has also raised suspicions in Washington that Bin Laden may have been protected by Pakistani security forces while on the run.”

The EFE news agency inquired what Pakistan citizens thought about that.

According to that agency, 66 per cent of Pakistanis do not believe that the US Special Forces killed Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda; they think they killed another person, according to a joint poll ran by the British demoscopic institute, YouGov, and Polis, from Cambridge University.

The poll was said to have been carried out among Internet users, who usually have a higher educational level, in three big cities:  Karachi, Islamabad and Lahore. The poll excluded rural demographic groups, which makes results to be all the more surprising, according to researchers.

Reportedly, 75 per cent of those polled said they also disapproved the violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty by the United States during the operation to capture and kill Bin Laden.

It was also reported that less than three fourths of those polled do not believe Bin Laden approved the 9/11 attacks against the United States, which justified the US invasion in Afghanistan and the war against Islamic terrorism.

According to the poll, 74 per cent think that Washington’s government does not have any respect for Islam and considers itself at war with the Islamic world; 70 per cent disapproves the Pakistani policy of accepting US economic aid.

Eighty six per cent are said to oppose also to the fact that the Pakistani government may in the future –and criticized the possibility that they may have done in the past- authorize attacks using drones against military groups.

Sixty one per cent of the Pakistanis who were interrogated said they sympathized with the Taliban or believed they could represent respectable viewpoints, against only 21 per cent who are radically opposed to them.

Reuters equally published some interesting reports:

“One of Osama bin Laden’s wives told Pakistani interrogators that the Al Qaeda leader and his family had been living for five years in the compound where he was killed by U.S. forces this week, a security official said on Friday.

“The official, who identified the woman as Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, the youngest of Bin Laden’s three wives, told Reuters she was wounded in the raid.

“The security official said Abdulfattah told investigators: ‘We have been living there for the past five years’.”

“Pakistani security forces took between 15 and 16 people into custody from the compound after U.S. forces removed Bin Laden’s body, said the security official. Those detained included Bin Laden’s three wives and several children.”

According to a report published by ANSA, a US drone killed today no less than 15 persons in Waziristan, north of Pakistan. Others were seriously injured. But, who would care about those daily killings in that country?

However, I ask myself one question: Why is there so much coincidence between the assassination that was carried out at Abbottabad and the attempt to simultaneously assassinate Gaddafi?

One of Gaddafi’s youngest sons, who was not involved with political issues, Sarif al Arab, was accompanied by his little son and two little cousins at the house where he lived; Gaddafi and his wife had visited him shortly before the attacks launched by NATO bombers. The house was destroyed; Sarif al Arab and the three kids were killed. Gaddafi and his wife had left shortly before the attack. That was an unprecedented event. But the world has hardly known about that.

Was it a mere chance that such an event coincided with the attack against Osama Bin Laden’s refuge, which was perfectly known by the US government, which kept a close watch on it?

News released today by Vatican City reported as follows:

“May 6 (ANSA) – Giovanni Innocenzo Martinelli, Apostolic Vicar of Tripoli, said today to the Vatican’s agency FIDES: ‘I certainly do not want to interfere with the political activity of anyone, but I have the duty to declare that the bombings on Libya are immoral’.

“I am surprised that statements were made on the fact that I should deal only with spiritual matters and that the bombings have been authorized by the UN. The UN, NATO or the European Union doesn’t have the moral authority to decide to bomb Libya, he said.”

“Let me stress that bombing is not dictated my moral or social conscience of the West or humanity in general. Bombing is always an immoral act.”

Another news published by ANSA on May 6 reports that the governments of China and Russia expressed their deep concern about the war in Libya and said they will work together to call for a cease fire.

According to the Chinese Foreign Minister Jechi Yang, they strongly believed that the most important goal was to achieve an immediate cease fire.

Truly worrying events are happening.

Fidel Castro Ruz
May 6, 2011
8:17 p.m.

We also immediately opened our country’s airports to the American airplanes that were unable to land anywhere, given the chaos that came about soon after the strike.

The traditional stand adopted by the Cuban Revolution, which was always opposed to any action that could jeopardize the life of civilians, is well known.

Although we resolutely supported the armed struggle against Batista’s tyranny, we were, on principle, opposed to any terrorist action that could cause the death of innocent people. Such behavior, which has been maintained for more than half a century, gives us the right to express our views about such a sensitive matter.

On that day, at a public gathering that took place at Ciudad Deportiva, I expressed my conviction that international terrorism could never be eradicated through violence and war.

By the way, Bin Laden was, for many years, a friend of the US, a country that gave him military training; he was also an adversary of the USSR and Socialism. But, whatever the actions attributed to him, the assassination of an unarmed human being while surrounded by his own relatives is something abhorrent. Apparently this is what the government of the most powerful nation that has ever existed did.

In the carefully drafted speech announcing Bin Laden’s death Obama asserts as follows:

“…And yet we know that the worst images are those that were unseen to the world. The empty seat at the dinner table. Children who were forced to grow up without their mother or their father. Parents who would never know the feeling of their child’s embrace. Nearly 3,000 citizens taken from us, leaving a gaping hole in our hearts.”

That paragraph expressed a dramatic truth, but can not prevent honest persons from remembering the unjust wars unleashed by the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan, the hundreds of thousands of children who were forced to grow up without their mothers and fathers and the parents who would never know the feeling of their child’s embrace.

Millions of citizens were taken from their villages in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Cuba and many other countries of the world.

Still engraved in the minds of hundreds of millions of persons are also the horrible images of human beings who, in Guantanamo, an occupied Cuban territory, walk down in silence, being submitted for months, and even for years, to unbearable and excruciating tortures. Those are persons who were kidnapped and transferred to secret prisons with the hypocritical connivance of supposedly civilized societies.

Obama has no way to conceal that Osama was executed in front of his children and wives, who are now under the custody of the authorities of Pakistan, a Muslim country of almost 200 million inhabitants, whose laws have been violated, its national dignity offended and its religious traditions desecrated.
How could he now prevent the women and children of the person who was executed outside the law and without any trial from explaining what happened? How could he prevent those images from being broadcast to the world?

On January 28 of 2002 the CBS journalist Dan Rather reported on that TV network that on September 10 of 2001, one day before the attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Osama Bin Laden underwent a hemodialysis at a military hospital in Pakistan. He was physically unfit to hide and take shelter inside deep caves.

Having assassinated him and plunging his corpse into the bottom of the sea are an expression of fear and insecurity which turn him into a far more dangerous person.

The US public opinion itself, after the initial euphoria, will end up criticizing the methods that, far from protecting its citizen, will multiply the feelings of hatred and revenge against them.

Fidel Castro Ruz
May 4, 2011
8:34 p.m.

Doing so was a duty that I did not hesitate for a second to fulfill.

I knew that the state of my health was serious, but I felt tranquil: the Revolution would continue advancing; it was not in its most difficult moment after the USSR and the socialist camp had disappeared. Bush had been on the throne since 2001, and had designated a government for Cuba; but once again, mercenaries and members of the bourgeoisie remained in their golden exile with their suitcases and trunks.

In addition to Cuba, the Yankees now had another Revolution in Venezuela. The close cooperation between these two countries will also go down in the history of the Americas as an example of the vast revolutionary potential of the peoples of the same origin, with the same history.

Among the many points covered in the draft report to the 6th Congress of the Party, one of those which most interested me was the one related to power. Textually it states: “…we have come to the conclusion that it is advisable to recommend that tenure in fundamental political and state positions be limited to a maximum of two consecutive five-year terms. This is possible and necessary under the current conditions, quite different from those prevailing in the first decades of the Revolution, not yet consolidated and moreover, already the target of constant threats and aggression.”

I liked the idea; it was an issue on which I had meditated a lot. Accustomed from the early years of the Revolution to read news agency cables every day, I knew about the development of events in our world, the wise moves and errors of parties and human beings. Examples during the past 50 years abound.

I will not quote any in order not to extend myself too much or bruise anyone’s sensitivity. I am convinced that the fate of the world would be very different at this moment if it weren’t for the errors committed by revolutionary leaders who were distinguished by their talent and merits. Neither do I delude myself that the task will be easier in the future, on the contrary.

I am simply saying what, in my view I consider it an elementary duty of Cuban revolutionaries. The smaller a country and the more difficult the circumstances, the more obliged it is to avoid errors.

I have to confess that I was never really bothered about the time that I would be exercising the role of president of the Councils of State and Ministers and the first secretary of the Party. Since we landed I was also, Comandante en Jefe of the little troop which later grew so much. Since the Sierra Maestra I had resisted acting as provisional president of the country in the wake of the victory while I focused attention on our forces, still very modest in 1957; I did so because ambitions in relation to that position were already obstructing the struggle.

I was practically obligated to occupy the position of Prime Minister in the initial months of 1959.

Raúl knew that, at the present time, I would not accept any position within the Party; it was always him who described me as first secretary and Comandante en Jefe, functions which, as is known, I delegated in the abovementioned proclamation when I became gravely ill. I never attempted to undertake them nor could I physically have done so, even when I had considerably recovered the capacity to analyze and write.

However, he always conveyed the ideas he planned to introduce to me.

Another problem came up: the organizing committee was discussing the total number of Central Committee members to be proposed to the Congress. With very good judgment, the committee supported the idea sustained by Raúl of the need for an increased presence of women and descendants of African slaves in the heart of the Central Committee. Both these sectors were the poorest and most exploited by capitalism in our country.

At the same time, there were some compañeros who, given their age or health, would be unable to provide many services to the Party, but Raúl thought that it would be very harsh to exclude them from the list of candidates. I didn’t hesitate to suggest to him that those compañeros should not be excluded from such an honor, and added that the most important thing was that I not appear on that list.

I think that I have received too many honors. I never thought that I would live so long; the enemy did everything possible to prevent it; trying to eliminate me on innumerable occasions, and many times I “collaborated” with them.

The Congress was advancing at such a rate that I had no time to send a single word on the matter before receiving the ballot.

Around midday, Raúl sent me a ballot with his aide, and thus I was able to exercise my vote as a delegate to the Congress, an honor conceded me by Party members in Santiago de Cuba, without me knowing anything about it. I did not do so mechanically. I read the biographies of the new members proposed. They are excellent people, a number of whom I met during the launch of a book on our revolutionary war in the University of Havana’s Aula Magna, during contacts with the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, in meetings with scientists, with intellectuals and in other activities. I voted and even asked for photos of the moment when I exercised that right.

I also recalled that I still have a lot to write on the history of battle at the Bay of Pigs. I am working on that and I am committed to delivering it soon; moreover, I have it in mind writing about another important event that came afterwards.

All of that before the end of the world!

What do you think?

Fidel Castro Ruz
April 18, 2011
4:55 p.m.

Translated by Granma International

Sophisticated mass media has been saturating our minds with the news of civil wars, arms trade associated with drugs that in just five years have killed more than 35,000 people in Mexico, climatic changes in various countries, asphyxiating heat waves, mountains of ice melting at the poles, torrential rains, shortages and growing prices for foods. We really need some consolation and this has just reached us via that life-saving angel of our species, the United Nations Security Council and its colossal invention: good conduct certificates.

Of course we already know, through the Europa Press Agency, that the number of persons who died as a result of the earthquake and the tsunami were 6,539, and 10,259 were missing, “according to the latest toll”.

Although we still do not know “the exact whereabouts of thousands of people”, the governor of a prefecture has suggested that the survivors ought to move to another part of Japan.

“Damaged airports, ports and highways are being gradually repaired”, a Japanese news agency states.

The British agency Reuters was less optimistic when it stated that “a ‘Chernobyl solution’ could be the last resort” but authorities say that “it is still too soon to talk about long-range measures and that first we have to try to cool the plant’s six reactors and the fuel-storage pools.”

Professor Murray Jennex at San Diego State University in California said: “They (reactors) are kind of like a coffee maker. If you leave it on the heat, they boil dry and then they crack, ‘”

“Putting concrete on that wouldn’t help keep your coffee maker safe. But eventually, yes, you could build a concrete shield and be done with it.”

Another dispatch from the European agency stated:

“We launched a ‘race against the clock’ to cool down the reactors, declared General Director of the International Atomic Energy Agency Yukiya Amano.”

“‘We are dealing with a very serious accident’, said Amano after meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, in reference to the Fukushima nuclear plant.”

Without a doubt, the world had been jolted by the unexpected accident in Japan, that moved even the foundations of the planet’s energy development; 442 nuclear plants were functioning, great need for repairs; the Chernobyl accident in 1986 had paralyzed construction programmes of new facilities which were about to resume and be extended.

Wouldn’t our concerns over NATO’s war actions in northern Africa to occupy the rich Libyan fields of light oil and ensure the enormous energy resources in the Middle East after the revolutionary eruption in Arab nations be exaggerated?

Serious threats of a new economic crisis were upsetting economists.

Bad news on the political front keeps on coming.

AFP states that thousands of Shiite demonstrators were shouting anti-government slogans near Manama after Friday prayers, even though Bahraini authorities have prohibited crowds from gathering.

“Repression ['] this week caused at least eight deaths: four demonstrators and four police.”

“‘We are ready to sacrifice our blood and our souls for Bahrain’, shouted the demonstrators.”

“Bahraini authorities decreed the exclusion state this week ['] within this small kingdom where the US has a base for its Fifth Fleet.”

AFP, March18, 2011

“More than 30 died and around a hundred were injured on Friday after demonstrators were shot at as they demanded the resignation of Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh in Sanah, according to a new toll reported by medical sources.”

“‘Most of those injured were hit by bullets to the head, neck and chest area’, a doctor told AFP.”

This is a close United States ally that also has the support of Saudi forces.

AP, March 18, 2011

“King Abdullah (of Saudi Arabia) spoke after Muslim prayers on Friday. He thanked residents and security forces for being ‘the hands’ of national stability.”

“Islamabad, March 18, (AFP) – thousands demonstrated on Friday in the streets of several Pakistani cities to protest against the American unmanned plane attack that killed 35 people this week and the liberation of a CIA employee who was being held for murder.” He had been set free after two million dollars had been paid to the relatives of the two men he killed in a Lahore street.

Why do we have the Security Council, the veto, the anti-veto, the majority, the minority, abstention, speeches, demagoguery and the solemn declarations of Ban Ki-moon?

Above all, why do we have NATO, its 5.5 million soldiers (according to highly qualified specialists) and its 19,845 tanks, 57,938 armoured vehicles, 6,492 fighter jets, 2,482 helicopters, 19 aircraft carriers, 156 submarines, 303 surface vessels, 5,728 nuclear missiles, tens of thousands of atomic bombs with the destructive power equivalent to hundreds of thousand times the capacity of those dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

There is more than enough of such stupid power, it wouldn’t be used, nor can it be used; we would need dozens of planet such as Earth. Its only purpose is to demonstrate the waste and the chaos generated by capitalism.

We can dedicate our time to other things, less sinister and more ludicrous.

For example, the DPA agency informs us:

“Port-au-Prince, March 18, 2011. The arrival of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in Port-au-Prince this Friday cannot have taken anyone by surprise.”

“January 19: From South Africa, Aristide published an ‘open letter’ where he says he is ‘ready’ to return to Haiti’ at any time to ‘contribute as a simple citizen in the field of education’…”

“January 20: The American State Department is opposed to the return of Aristide before at least the end of the electoral process…”.

The State Department has gotten mixed up even in this: it was the US that gave birth to Papa Doc, and it had overthrown and expelled President Aristide to Africa 7 years ago.

A Notimex dispatch, dated in Panama today, March 18th, informed that WikiLeaks revealed the entry of US warships to Panama:

“The covenant was signed on April 15, 2009 so that military vessels could enter Panamanian waters between May 3rd and the end of Torrijos’ term on June 30th this year, when the president was succeeded by the right-wing Ricardo Martinelli.

“‘Until now, the Panamanian government has always refused to do this requirement arguing that operations with the United States Army were a sensitive matter for Panamanians””

Another interesting tale about the trickery of US foreign policy is told today by AP:

“Chile and the United States signed a nuclear energy treaty on Friday, despite the fears of the spread of radiation in Japan”.

“The fear arises after a devastating earthquake and subsequent tidal wave severely affected the nuclear reactors in a plant on the north-eastern coast of Japan”.

“The treaty was signed on Friday morning by US Ambassador Alejandro Wolff and Chilean Minister of Foreign Affairs Alfredo Moreno.”

“‘White House officials were not able to confirm the highly awaited signing which one supposes would be a notable event during the visit to Chile on Monday of President Barack Obama.”

But no matter, appearances can always be life-saving and public opinion can be manipulated by appearances; White House officials emphasized “that the treaty focuses on training nuclear engineers and not on the construction of reactors.”

Since Japanese nuclear technology is basically Yankee, their technicians surely would acquire more experience studying what happened in that beleaguered country whose population was victim of a cruel and unscrupulous predecessor of the current president of the United States.

Who are Obama, NATO and Ban Ki-moon going to fool with good conduct certificates?

Fidel Castro Ruz
March 18, 2011
8:54 p.m.

When the Spanish “discovered” us five hundred years ago, the estimated population on the Island was no more than 200,000 inhabitants who were living in harmony with nature. Their main sources of food came from the rivers, lakes and seas rich in protein; they were also carrying out a rudimentary form of agriculture that supplied them with calories, vitamins, mineral salts and fibre.

In some regions of Cuba they still have the custom of making “casabe”, a kind of bread made from casaba. Certain fruits and small wild animals rounded off their diets. They used to concoct a beverage with fermented products and they brought to world culture the rather unhealthy habit of smoking.

The current population of Cuba is possibly 60 times greater than the one existing then. Although the Spanish mixed with the native population, they practically exterminated them by making them work in the fields as semi-slaves and by the search for gold in the river sands.

The native population was replaced by the importing of Africans captured by force and enslaved, a cruel practice that was applied during centuries.

Of great importance for our existence were the eating habits that were created. We were turned into consumers of pork, beef, lamb, milk, cheese and other by-products; wheat, oats, barley, chickpeas, kidney beans, peas and other legumes coming from different climates.

Originally we had corn and sugar cane was introduced among the calorie-rich plants.

Coffee was brought in by the conquistadors from Africa; cacao was possibly brought from Mexico. Both of these, along with sugar, tobacco and other tropical products became enormous sources of resources for the metropolis after the slave rebellion in Haiti that occurred at the beginning of the nineteenth century.

The slave-based production system lasted in fact until the transfer of Cuban sovereignty by Spanish colonialism to the United States, in a bloody and extraordinary war where Spain had been defeated by the Cubans.

When the Revolution triumphed in 1959, our island was a true Yankee colony. The United States had duped and disarmed our Liberation Army. One couldn’t speak of developed agriculture, but of immense plantations exploited on the base of manual and animal labor that in general used neither fertilizers nor machinery. The great sugar mills belonged to the Americans. Several of them had more than one hundred thousand hectares; others were tens of thousands of hectares in size. All together there were more than 150 sugar mills, including those belonging to Cubans; they were working less than four months a year.

The US received Cuban sugar during two great world wars, and had conceded a sales quota on its markets to our country, tied in with commercial commitments and limitations on our agricultural production, despite the fact that sugar was in part produced by them. Other decisive branches of the economy such as the ports and the oil refineries were American property. Their companies possessed huge ships, industrial centers, mines, docks, maritime and rail lines along with public services as vital as the electric and telephone systems.

For those who want to understand, that’s all you need.

In spite of the fact that the necessities of rice, corn, fats, grains and other food production were important, the United States was imposing determinate limits on everything that was in competition with its own domestic production, including the subsidized sugar beet.

Of course, in terms of food production it is a real fact that within the geographical limits of a small, rainy and hurricane-beset tropical country bereft of machinery, dams, irrigation systems and adequate equipment, Cuba could not have the resources, nor did it have the conditions to compete with the American mechanized productions of soy, sunflower, corn, legumes and rice. Some of these, such as wheat and barley could not be grown in our country.

It is a fact that the Cuban Revolution has not enjoyed a moment of peace. The Agrarian Reform had barely been passed, before the five-month mark of the revolutionary triumph had been reached and the programs of sabotage, fires, obstruction and the use of harmful chemical measures were begun against our country. These even came to include pests to attack vital productions and even human health.

By underestimating our people and their decision to fight for their rights and their independence, they committed an error.

Of course, none of us at that time possessed the experience collected during many years; we were taking off from fair ideas and a revolutionary conception. Perhaps the main error of idealism that was committed, was to think that in the world there was a determinate amount of justice and respect for the rights of peoples when, certainly, it didn’t exist at all. Nevertheless, the decision to fight wouldn’t depend on this.

The first task taking up our efforts was to prepare for the struggle that was coming up.

Experience acquired in the heroic battle against Batista’s tyranny showed that the enemy, no matter what his strength, could not defeat the Cuban people.

The country’s preparation for the struggle turned into the people’s main effort, and it took us to episodes that were as decisive as the battle against the mercenary invasion promoted by the United States in April of 1961, the landing at the Bay of Pigs escorted by the US Marines and Yankee planes.

Unable to resign themselves to the independence and exercise of the sovereign rights of Cuba, the government of that country adopted the decision to invade our territory. The USSR had absolutely nothing to do with the triumph of the Cuban Revolution. The Revolution did not assume a socialist nature because of support from the USSR; it was the other way around: support from the USSR was produced by the socialist nature of the Cuban Revolution. To such a degree, that when the USSR disappears, Cuba keeps on being socialist.

By some means, the USSR learned that Kennedy would try to use Cuba with the same method that they had applied in Hungary. That led to the errors committed by Khrushchev in regards to the October Crisis that I saw the need to criticize. But it was not only Khrushchev who made a mistake, so did Kennedy. Cuba had nothing to do with the history of Hungary, and the USSR had nothing to do with the Revolution in Cuba. This was the sole and exclusive fruit of the struggle of our people. Khrushchev merely made the brotherly gesture of sending weapons to Cuba when it was being threatened by the invasion that was organized, trained, armed and transported by the United States. Without the weapons sent to Cuba, our people would have defeated the mercenary forces as it had defeated Batista’s army and occupied all the military equipment it possessed: 100,000 weapons. If the direct invasion of the United States against Cuba had occurred, our people would have been fighting right up to the present time against its soldiers, who would surely have had to fight against millions of Latin Americans. The US had committed the greatest mistake in all its history and perhaps the USSR would still be in existence today.

Hours prior to the invasion, after the cunning attack on our air force bases by US planes painted with Cuban insignia, the socialist nature of our Revolution was declared. The Cuban people fought for socialism in that battle that passed into history as the first victory against imperialism in the Americas.

Ten US presidents have come and gone, the eleventh is now passing through and the Socialist Revolution is standing firm. Also coming and going were all the governments that were accomplices to the crimes of the United States against Cuba, and our Revolution is standing firm. The USSR has disappeared and the Revolution moved forward. It didn’t take place with the permission of the United States; instead it is being submitted to a cruel and merciless blockade; with terrorist acts that took the lives or injured thousands of people, whose authors today enjoy total impunity; anti-terrorist Cuban fighters are condemned to life sentences; a so-called Cuban Adjustment Act concedes entry, residence and employment in the United States. Cuba is the only country in the world whose citizens have that privilege, one that is denied to Haitians after the earthquake that killed more than 300,000 persons and the rest of the citizens in the hemisphere, those being persecuted and expelled by the empire. Nevertheless, the Cuban Revolution stands firm.

Cuba is the only country on the planet that cannot be visited by US citizens; but Cuba exists and stands firm, only 90 miles away from the United States, fighting its heroic fight.

We, the Cuban revolutionaries, have committed errors, and we shall go on making mistakes, but never shall we make the mistake of being traitors.

Never have we chosen illegality, lies, demagoguery, duping the people, pretence, hypocrisy, opportunism, bribery, the total lack of ethics, abuses of power, including crime and repugnant tortures which, with obvious albeit doubtlessly worthy exceptions, have characterized the conduct of the presidents of the United States.

At this moment, humankind is facing serious problems without precedent. The worst is that to a large degree the solutions shall depend upon the richest and most developed countries, the countries that shall reach a situation which they are really in no condition to face unless the world they have been trying to mould for their egoistic interests crumbles around them and which inevitably leads to disaster.

I am not speaking about wars, whose risks and consequences have been transmitted by wise and brilliant people, including many Americans.

I am referring to the food crisis originating in the economic facts and the climatic changes that are apparently now irreversible as a consequence of the actions of man, but which, at any rate, human minds are under the obligation to face in a hurry. For years, which was really time lost, the matter was being talked about. But the country which emits the greatest amount of polluting gases in the world, the United States, was regularly ignoring world opinion. Leaving protocol and the other customary stupidities of the men of state in consumer societies to one side, things that the influence of the media usually bewildered them with once they came into power, the reality is that they didn’t pay any attention to the matter. An alcoholic, whose problems were widely known, and I don’t need to name him, imposed his line of thinking upon the international community.

The problems have suddenly taken shape now, through the phenomena that are being repeated on every continent: heat waves, forest fires, losses of harvests in Russia, with many victims; climate changes in China, excessive rainfalls or droughts, progressive losses of water reserves in the Himalayas threatening India, China, Pakistan and other countries; excessive rainfall in Australia that have flooded almost a million square kilometers; unusually harsh and unseasonable cold waves in Europe that have considerable impact on agriculture; droughts in Canada; unusual cold waves there and in the US; unprecedented rain in Colombia affecting millions of farming land; never-before seen rainfall in Venezuela; catastrophes caused by excessive rain in the great cities of Brazil and droughts in the South. There is practically no region in the world where such events have not taken place.

Productions of wheat, soy bean, corn, rice and other numerous grains and legumes that make up the food base of the world – whose population today according to calculations totals almost 6.9 billion inhabitants, now coming close to the new figure of 7billion, and where more than one billion are suffering from hunger and malnutrition – are being seriously affected by climate changes, creating a very serious problem in the world. When reserves have not been totally recovered or just partially in some items, a serious threat is now creating problems and destabilization in many States.

More than 80 countries, all of them in the Third World, already having difficult problems of their own, are being threatened with real famines.

I shall limit myself to quote these statements and reports, in a summary fashion, which have been published in the last few days:

“The UN is warning about the risk of a new food crisis.

“January 11, 2011 (AFP)”

“‘We are facing a very tense situation’…” FAO corroborates.

“Some 80 countries are facing a shortage of food…”

“The global rate of prices for basic agricultural products (grains, meat, sugar, oleaginous and dairy products) is currently at its highest level since FAO began to use that index rate 20 years ago.”

“UNITED NATIONS, January (IPS),”

“The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), with headquarters in Rome, last week alerted that world prices for rice, wheat, sugar, barley and meat […] would undergo significant increases in 2011…”

“PARIS, January 10 (Reuters) – President Nicolas Sarkozy of France shall be taking his campaign to confront the high global food prices to Washington this week …”

“Basel (Switzerland), January 10 (EFE).- The president of the Central European Bank (BCE), Jean Claude Trichet, spokesperson for the governors of the central banks of the Group of 10 (G-10), today cautioned about the strong rise in food prices and the inflationist threat in emerging economies.”

“The World Bank fears a crisis in the price of foods, January 15 (BBC)

“The president of the World Bank, Robert Zoellick, told the BBC that the crisis would be deeper than that of 2008.”

“MEXICO DF, January 7 (Reuters)”

“The annual rhythm of inflation for foods has increased threefold in Mexico in November as compared to two months ago…”

“Washington, January 18 (EFE)

“The climate change will aggravate the lack of foods, according to a study.”

“‘Since more than 20 years ago, scientists have been alerting about the impact of climate change, but nothing is changing other than the increase in emissions that cause global warning’, Liliana Hisas, executive director of the US affiliate of this organization told EFE.

“Osvaldo Canziani, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 and scientific advisor for the report, indicated that ‘in the entire world meteorological episodes and extreme climatic conditions are being recorded, and increases in average surface temperatures are exacerbating the intensity of these episodes’.”

“(Reuters) January 18, Algeria is buying wheat to avoid shortages and unrest.

“The State grain agency of Algeria has bought around 1 million tons of wheat in the last two weeks to avoid shortages in the case of unrest, a Ministry of Agriculture source informed Reuters.

“(Reuters) January 18, Wheat shows a strong gain in Chicago after Algerian purchases.”

“The Economist, January 18, 2011

“World alert due to food prices”

“Among the main causes are the floods and droughts caused by climatic changes, the use of foods to manufacture bio-fuels and speculation in commodities prices.”

The problems are dramatically serious. However, all is not lost.

Current calculated wheat production reached almost 650 million tons.

That of corn surpasses that amount and nears 770 million tons.

Soy could come close to 260 million tons; of this the US calculates 92 million and Brazil 77 million. They are the two greatest producers. The general data on grains and legumes available in 2011 are well-known.

The first matter to be resolved by the world community would be to choose between foods and bio-fuels. Brazil, a developing country, shall of course have to be compensated.

If the millions of tons of soy and corn being invested into bio-fuels are routed towards the production of foods, the unusual rise in prices would cease and the world`s scientists would be able to propose formulae that might in some way or other halt and even reverse the situation.

We have lost too much time. The time has come to do something now.

Fidel Castro Ruz
January 19, 2011
9:55 p.m.

It was the deed of an unbalanced person, drunk on the preaching of hatred that reigns in American society, where the fascist Tea Party has imposed its extremism on the Republican Party which, under the aegis of George W. Bush, led the world to where it is now, on the brink of the abyss.

Added to the disaster of wars was the greatest economic crisis in the history of the United States and a government debt that today is equal to 100 percent of the GDP, together with a monthly deficit totaling more than 80 billion USD and again more homes being lost as a result of unpaid mortgages. The prices of oil, metals, and food are progressively going up. Lack of confidence in paper currency causes gold purchases to increase and there are quite a few people who see the price of gold ascending to $ 2,000 a Troy ounce. There are some who even think it will reach $2,500.

Climatic phenomena have worsened, with considerable losses to harvests in the Russian Federation, Europe, China, Australia, North and South America and in other areas, putting in danger the food supplies for more than 80 Third World countries, creating political instability in a growing number of them.

The world is facing so many political, military, energy, food and environmental problems that there is no country wanting the United States to return to extremist positions that would increase the risks of nuclear war.

International condemnation of the crime in Arizona was almost unanimous, a crime that demonstrates an expression of that extremism. No one expected the President of the United States to make an impassioned or confrontational speech, something that wouldn’t correspond to his style or with the domestic circumstances and the climate of irrational hatred that is prevailing in the United States. The victims of the shooting were definitely brave, each with their merit, and in general they were humble citizens; if it hadn’t been so, they wouldn’t have been there, defending the right of all Americans to medical care and opposing the anti-immigrant laws.

The mother of a 9-year-old girl born on September 11th had courageously stated that the hatred unleashed in the world had to cease. I do not harbor any doubt in the least that the victims were worthy of recognition by the President of the United States, along with the citizens of Tucson, the students at the University and the doctors who, whenever events of this type occur, always unreservedly express the solidarity which human beings carry inside themselves. The severely wounded congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords, deserves the national and international accolade being given her. Today, the medical team was continuing to give positive information on the state of her condition.

Of course, Obama’s speech was lacking the moral condemnation of the policies which inspired such an act.

I was trying to imagine how men such as Franklin Delano Roosevelt would have acted in similar circumstances, not to mention Lincoln who didn’t shrink from giving his famous Gettysburg Address. What other moment is the President of the United States waiting for to express the opinion that I am sure is being shared by the great majority of US people?

It is not a matter of the government of the United States lacking an exceptional personality to lead it. What transforms a president into a historical personage, who has been able to reach that position because of his merits, does not lie in the person, but in the need for him at a determinate moment in the history of his nation.

Yesterday when he began his speech, he looked tense, and very much dependent on the written pages. He soon recovered his calm, his usual command of the stage, and the precise words to express his ideas. What he didn’t say was because he didn’t want to say it.

For delivery of well-written and just praise for those deserving it, he could be awarded a prize.

For a political speech, he left a lot to be desired.

Fidel Castro Ruz
January 13, 2011
7:38 p.m.

A dispatch from the DPA agency informs the following:

Republican Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen will visit Haiti this Tuesday in what will be her first trip abroad since she was appointed chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the United States House of Representatives which is now in Republican hands, her office informed today in a press release.

During her stay in Port-au-Prince, the Cuban-born congresswoman said she hoped to receive a report on the ‘advances’ dealing with reconstruction of the devastated country, as well as on the ‘continued electoral controversy’ following the presidential elections of November 28th.

‘It is important for me to be able to go to Haiti, a country that is very close to and beloved by the United states’, stated the congresswoman from Florida, a state which is home to a great many Haitians.

‘It is very important for US interests and we have personal interest in seeing that stability, democracy and free enterprise take hold over there, she added.

I wonder whether the United States government is aware of the challenge to its moral authority the disturbing presence of Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in Haiti represents.

But that is not all; another dispatch, this time from the AP Agency coming from Port-au-Prince communicates the following:

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP)- Observers from the Organization of American States shall recommend that the governing-party candidate in the Haitian presidential elections be excluded from the second round in order to give up his spot to a popular musician who ended up in third place in the disputed first round of the elections, according to a copy of a report obtained by The Associated Press.

The OAS had scheduled the presentation of the document to President René Preval on Monday.

The report had not yet been made public, but AP obtained a copy and a diplomat familiar with its contents confirmed its recommendations. Another Foreign Affairs official said the document was in its last stage of being edited and translated into French, but affirmed that the conclusions would remain.

The Electoral Commission of Haiti will have to decide on how to answer the appeal, but the recommendations of the OAS team could bear a lot of weight. Three candidates consider they should be participating in the second round of elections. After the preliminary results of the first round were announced, the country was swept by a wave of unrest.

It is not foreseen that Preval would publically answer the report until after Wednesday, the one-year anniversary of the devastating earthquake of January 12, 2010.

The second round was scheduled for Sunday, but it was delayed in part to await the results of the OAS assessment that seeks to resolve the political impasse. Officials have stated that the elections will not be held until at least next month.

The country is completely calm. The fight against the epidemic is moving forward successfully. During the last 17 consecutive days the Cuban Medical Mission and the Henry Reeve Brigade have looked after 9,857 cholera patients without one single death.

President Preval had spoken with the diplomatic representatives, including the OAS representative, Brazilian writer Ricardo Seitenfus, about a political solution to the complicated problem.

According to news received, after that individual was suddenly fired by the OAS Secretary, the current problem came up. We hope that the representatives from Latin America and the countries accredited in the UN can avoid the chaos that might be created in Haiti if in the current situation the fight among rival parties is unleashed amid all the destruction, poverty and the epidemic that still mightily strikes at that nation.

Fidel Castro Ruz
January 10, 2011
9:50 p.m.

The nine-year-old girl who died was born on the same day the Twin Towers were destroyed and was an outstanding student. Her mother declared that there has to be a stop to such hatred.

A painful reality came to my mind, which surely would concern many honest U.S. citizens who have not been poisoned by lies and hatred. How many of them know that Latin America is the region with the greatest inequality in the distribution of wealth in the world? How many have been informed of the rates of infant and maternal mortality, life expectancy, medical services, child labor, education and poverty prevalent in other countries of the hemisphere?

I will confine myself to merely noting the level of violence, starting with the detestable event which took place yesterday in Arizona as a starting point.

I have already indicated that every year hundreds of thousands of Latin American and Caribbean immigrants, driven by underdevelopment and poverty, make their way to the United States and are arrested, often even separated from their close family members, and returned to their countries of origin.

Money and merchandise can cross the border freely, but, I repeat, not human beings, no. Drugs and weapons, on the contrary, cross unceasingly in one direction or the other. The United States is the largest consumer of drugs in the world and, at the same time, the largest supplier of weapons, symbolized by the gunsight cross-hairs published on Sarah Palin’s website and the M-16 on ex- marine Jesse Kelly’s election posters with the subliminal message to fire the full barrel.

Is U.S. public opinion aware of the level of violence in Latin America associated with inequality and poverty?

Why is the relevant information not released?

An article by Spanish journalist and author Xavier Caño Tamayo, published on the ALAI website, offers some facts that U.S, citizens should know.

Although the author is skeptical about the methods currently being used to defeat the power gained by the big drug traffickers, his article provides information of unquestionable value which I will try to summarize within a few lines.

“… 27% of violent deaths in the world occur in Latin America, although its population represents less than 9% of the planet’s total. Over the last 10 years, 1.2 million people have died violently in the region.

“Violent slums occupied by military police, murders in Mexico, disappearances, assassinations and massacres in Colombia […] the highest murder rate in the world is in Latin America.

“How can such a terrible reality be explained?

“The answer is provided in a recent study by the Latin American Social Science Foundation. The report shows how poverty, inequality and lack of opportunity are the fundamental sources of violence, although trafficking in drugs and handguns act as accelerators of murder crimes.

“According to the Ibero-American Organization of Youth, half of Latin American young people aged 15 to 24 are without work and have little chance of finding any. [...] According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the region has one of the highest rates of informal employment among youth and one in four Latin American youths is not working or studying.

“According to ECLAC, in the last few years, poverty and extreme poverty in Latin America has affected and is affecting 35% of the population, almost 190 million Latin Americans. And, according to the OECD [Cooperation and Economic Development Organization], some 40 million more citizens have succumbed or will succumb to poverty in Latin America before the end of this 2010.

“According to the United Nations, poverty exists when people cannot satisfy basic needs in order to live with dignity: adequate nutrition, potable water, decent housing, essential medical care, basic education… the World Bank quantifies this poverty, adding that those facing extreme poverty survive on less than $1.25 a day.

“According to a report on world wealth in 2010 published by Capgemini and Merrill Lynch, the fortunes of the Latin America rich […] grew 15% in 2009 […] in the last two years, the fortunes of the Latin America rich grew more than in any other region of the world. There are 500,000 rich, according to the report by Capgemini and Merrill Lynch. Half a million, as opposed to 190 [...] if so few have so much, many are in need of everything.

“… There are other ways to explain violence in Latin America [...] poverty and inequality are always related to death and pain. [...] Is it an accident that [...] 64% of the eight million who died as a result of cancer in the world lived in regions with the lowest income, where only 5% of the funds dedicated to cancer are spent?

“In your heart and looking us in our eyes, could you live on $1.25 a day?” Xavier Caño concludes his article.

The news of the massacre in Arizona is filling today’s pages of the main U.S. media today.

Specialists at the University of Arizona Medical Center in Tucson are cautiously optimistic. They have praised the work of emergency personnel who saw to it that the Congresswoman was treated within 38 minutes of the shooting. Such information was available on the Internet between 6:00 and 700pm this afternoon.

According to these reports, “The bullet entered the forehead, very close to the brain, on the left side of the head.”

“She can follow simple directions, but we know that inflammation of the brain could cause a turn for the worse,” they stated.

They explain the details of every one of the steps taken to control her respiration and reduce pressure on the brain. They add that her recovery could take weeks or months. Neurosurgeons in general and experts in the field, will follow with interest the information released by the medical team.

Cubans follow health issues closely, are usually well informed and are will also be pleased by the success of those doctors.

On the other side of the border, we know the extremes to which violence has escalated in the adjoining Mexican states, where there are also excellent doctors. Nevertheless, it is not unusual for drug traffickers, equipped with the most sophisticated weapons produced by the U.S. war industry, to enter operating rooms to finish off their victims.

The infant mortality rate in Cuba is less than 5 for every 1,000 live births; and the victims of violent acts, less than 5 for every 100,000 residents.

Although it belies our modesty, it is our bitter responsibility to indicate for the record that our blockaded, threatened and slandered country has demonstrated that Latin American peoples can live without violence and without drugs. They can even live, as has transpired for more than half a century, without relations with the United States. The latter, we have not demonstrated; they have done so.

Fidel Castro Ruz
January 9, 2011
7: 56 p.m.

Along its arid surface, many of those who emigrate from Mexico, Central America and other Latin American countries try to escape hunger, poverty and the underdevelopment to which those countries have been led by the United States. Money and goods can freely cross the border; human beings cannot. Without mentioning the drugs and weapons that cross that line in either direction.

Hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans who work in that country doing the toughest and worst paid jobs are captured each year and sent back to their points of departure, many times separated from their closest kin. They were hoping that the new administration would correct that criminal and inhuman policy.

According to just-arrived news, 18 people were shot and six died, among them a 9-year-old girl and Federal Judge John Roll.

The congresswoman was seriously wounded by a bullet in the head. Doctors were fighting to save her life.

She is married to NASA astronaut Mark Kelly. She was first elected to Congress in 2006 at the age of 36. “She is a supporter of migrant reform, stem cell research and alternative energy”, measures that are hated by the far right.

She was re-elected as the Democratic representative in the past elections.

When her father was asked whether she had any enemies, he replied: “The entire Tea Party”.

It is known that the former US vice-presidential candidate in the 2008 elections and Tea Party leader, Sarah Palin, published on her website, as the aim for supporters of her party, a map of the congressional districts of 20 of the representatives who had backed President Obama´s proposed health reform bill and she had them marked with the viewfinder of a rifle.

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords’ political opponent was a former Marine who appeared in the electoral campaign with an M-16 in a message which apparently stated: “Help get rid of Gabrielle Giffords…shoot the entire ammo chamber of an M-16 with Jesse Kelly.”

In March 2010, Gabrielle´s district office was attacked. She stated that when people do that they were going to have to be aware of the consequences; political leaders should get together and set limits.

Any sensible person could well wonder whether such an act happened in Afghanistan or in an electoral district in Arizona.

Obama stated: “…an unspeakable tragedy, a number of Americans were shot…”

“And while we are continuing to receive information, we know that some have passed away, and that Representative Giffords is gravely wounded…”

“We do not yet have all the answers. What we do know is that such a senseless and terrible act of violence has no place in a free society…”

” I ask all Americans to join me and Michelle in keeping Representative Giffords, the victims of this tragedy, and their families in our prayers.”

His appeal is quite dramatic and very sad. Even those of us who don´t share his political or philosophical ideas in the least sincerely hope that no children, judges, congressmen or any US citizen should die in such an absurd and unjustifiable way.

It is sad to remember that in the world every year many millions of people are dying as the consequence of absurd wars, poverty, growing famines and the deterioration of the environment promoted by the wealthiest and most developed nations on the planet.

We would like Obama and the United States Congress to share those concerns with all the other peoples.

Fidel Castro Ruz
January 8, 2011
9:11 p.m.

First to speak was U.S. ambassador Ronald D. Godard, senior area advisor for western hemisphere affairs and head of his country’s delegation. His extraordinary words render analysis unnecessary in order to demonstrate that the denunciations of the Cuban foreign minister were absolutely just. His own affirmations suffice to reflect the callous cynicism of that country’s policy.

“The United States of America […] is firmly committed to supporting the desire of the Cuban people to freely determine their country’s future.”

“The United States of America […] has the sovereign right to conduct its economic relationship with another country. The U.S. economic relationship with Cuba is a bilateral issue […] meant to encourage a more open environment in Cuba and increased respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

“We should not lose sight of that in a debate mired in rhetorical arguments of the past and focused on tactical differences—a debate that does nothing to help the Cuban people.”

“My delegation regrets that the delegation from Cuba continues, year after year, to inappropriately and incorrectly label U.S. trade restrictions on Cuba as an act of genocide. […] the United States holds no restriction on humanitarian aid to Cuba…”

“The United States in 2009 […] authorized $237 million in private humanitarian assistance in the form of gift parcels filled with food and other basic necessities, non-agricultural humanitarian donations, and medical donations.”

“In April 2009, President Obama stated ‘the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,’ but ‘there is a longer journey that must be traveled to overcome the decades of mistrust.’ […] we have initiated talks to re-establish direct mail service between the United States and Cuba, and we have increased artistic and cultural exchanges…”

“President Obama has stated publicly that the release of political prisoners and economic reforms are positive for the Cuban people. The United States hopes to see the fulfillment of these promises soon as well as a broader opening by the Cuban government to signal its willingness to engage constructively with its own people. […] it is the view of the United States that a new era in U.S.-Cuban relations cannot be fully realized until the Cuban people enjoy the internationally-recognized political and economic freedoms that this body has done so much to defend in other countries around the world.”

“My delegation will vote against this resolution. Indeed, the United States believes that it is high time for this body to focus its energies on supporting the Cuban people in their quest to freely decide their own future and move beyond the rhetorical posturing that this resolution represents.

“Thank you, Mr. President.”

Immediately after, explaining her intention of vote, came the head of the delegation from Nicaragua, whose people experienced the horrors of Ronald Reagan’s dirty war that caused so much bloodshed. Her words were forceful and convincing.

The vote took place and 187 countries voted in favor of the Resolution; two votes against: the United States and Israel, its inseparable ally in genocidal actions; and three abstentions: the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and Palau. Every country out of the 192 member states of the UN participated.

After the vote, the Belgian representative – on behalf of the European Union and an ally of the United States – opened the discussion for the delegations who wished to explain their vote.

Then, 16 countries with an outstanding leading role in international politics spoke to explain why they had voted in favor of the resolution. They appeared in the following order: Uruguay, Bolivia, Angola, Myanmar, Surinam, Belarus, St. Kitts & Nevis, Laos, Tanzania, Libya, Syria, Sudan, Vietnam, Nigeria, St. Vincent & the Grenadines and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

You should remember that many countries refrained from speaking at the request of our own delegation so that the voting process was not prolonged too much to the detriment of the best timetable for the development of the debate, and the overwhelming effort implied by the participation of a significant number of speakers. Despite that, 37 delegations spoke in very clear and precise terms in favor of the just resolution that, for the 19th occasion, was passed by the UN General Assembly. On this occasion, it was the most prolonged and energetic debate on that delicate and important issue.

At 4:17pm, Cuba’s reply was heard via the minister of foreign affairs of our country.

The essence of what he said, although almost all of the text was essential, was:

Mr. President:

“I would like to thank the three speakers for their words and the delegations present in this unexpected early evening session.

“Regarding what was said by the United States and the European Union:

“This is the 19th occasion on which the U.S. delegation has repeated the same things to us.

“The blockade is an act of economic warfare and an act of genocide.

“Could it be that the State Department has not done its homework or studied the matter?

“Last year, I read here the articles of the corresponding conventions…”

“I have already read here today Mr. Mallory’s famous memorandum.

“These are not “ideological arguments” from the past. The blockade is an old ice floe left over from the Cold War. It is not a rhetorical matter, but an act of aggression against Cuba.

“The aim of the United States is not to help or support the Cuban people. It is well known that the blockade provokes hardship and suffering. It does not provoke deaths because the Cuban Revolution prevents that. How can it justify punishing Cuban children as has been described here? If it wants to help or support the Cuban people, the only thing it has to do is lift the blockade immediately.

“Why do they prevent U.S. citizens from visiting Cuba and receiving information at first hand? Why do they restrict the so-called “people to people” contacts?

“The pretexts for the blockade have changed over time. First, for allegedly belonging to the Chinese-Soviet axis; then the supposed export of revolution to Latin America; then the presence of Cuban troops in Africa to help defeat the apartheid system, preserve Angolan independence and achieve it in Namibia.

“Later, the manipulation of human rights. But the blockade is a brutal violation of the human rights of the Cuban people.

“We are willing to discuss human rights violations. We could start with the concentration camp in Guantánamo where torture is practiced and habeas corpus does not exist. It is the kingdom of “Military Commissions,” outside of the rule of law. Could the U.S. delegation explain what happened in the camps of Abu Ghraib, Bagram and Nama?

“Were charges brought against those responsible? Were charges brought against those in European governments who authorized the secret prisons in Europe and the secret CIA flights carrying individuals who had been kidnapped? Can the representative of the European Union clarify that matter?

“We could talk about Wikileaks. Why don’t they tell us something about the atrocities detailed in the 75,000 documents on crimes committed in Afghanistan or the 400,000 on Iraq?”

“Changes in Cuba are a matter for the Cuban people. We will change everything that has to be changed, for the good of the Cuban people, but we will not ask for the opinion of the U.S. government. We freely chose our destiny. For that reason, we made a revolution. They will be sovereign changes, not “gestures”. We know that the only thing that would satisfy the United States would be the installation of a pro-yanki government in Cuba. But that is not going to happen.”

“You want cooperation between our universities? Eliminate the restrictions on academic, student, scientific and cultural exchanges and allow us to establish agreements between these institutions.

“You want cooperation on issues such as drug-trafficking, terrorism, human-trafficking, natural disasters and mail services? Respond, at the very least, to the proposal that we presented, unconditionally, more than one year ago.”

“A high-ranking official with USAID confirmed yesterday to journalist Tracey Eaton that, during the most recent period, $15.6 million dollars have been handed over to (and I quote) ‘individuals on the ground in Cuba.’ That’s what they call their mercenaries.

“The illegal radio and television broadcasts continue.

“The five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters are still unjustly incarcerated. Recently, with no motive whatsoever, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo was subjected to solitary confinement and denied medical attention.

“Self-confessed international terrorists such as Orlando Bosch and Posada Carriles freely walk the streets in Miami and even participate in political activities there.”

“The blockade is abusively extraterritorial and affects all those present here. It is not a bilateral matter.

“Mr. President:

“I have little to add to what has already been said about the European Union:

“We do not recognize any moral or political authority whatsoever on the part of that body in terms of human rights.

“It would do better to concern itself with its brutal anti-immigrant policy, the deportation of minorities, the violent repression of demonstrators and the growing social exclusion of its unemployed and low-income sectors.

“Shamelessly and disgracefully, the European Parliament devotes itself to awarding prizes to the paid agents of the U.S. government in Cuba.

“But the European Union is dreaming if it believes that it will be able to normalize relations with Cuba while the so-called Common Position exists.

“Thank you very much.”

We were all expecting the United States’ reply to Bruno’s reply. The best thing that the U.S. ambassador, and the delegation, did in his life – and without making the derogatory gesture of leaving the hall – was to withstand that volley of irrefutable arguments. Cuba’s reply left them paralyzed; I had the sensation that they were progressively fading away until disappearing from the scenario.

Over 50 years of blockade, the superpower has not been able to, nor will be able to, defeat the Cuban Revolution. I did not devote myself to the exercise of counting votes in favor or against the “Resolution.” Instead, I observed the warmth and the conviction of those who spoke against the unjust and arbitrary measure. It is an error to believe that that measure can be maintained indefinitely. It was an uprising. The peoples have had enough of aggression, plunder, abuse and deceit.

Never did the delegations express with such vigor their protest at the mockery implied by the contemptuous disregard of the world community’s just condemnation of an act of genocide, which is reiterated year after year. They are aware that the gravest act is the systematic plunder of their natural resources imposed on the majority of the peoples of the planet, the progressive scarcity of foodstuffs, the destruction of the environment, the growing number of genocidal wars against other peoples, supported by military bases located in more than 75 countries, and the growing danger of a suicidal conflagration for all the peoples of the world.

The UN cannot exist without the presence of the peoples who are demanding the end of the blockade. What use is that institution, which came into existence when the vast majority of us were not even independent, without us? What right do we have, if we cannot even demand that the blockade imposed on a little country must end? In one way or another we have been subordinated to the interests of the United States and NATO, a warmongering military organization that squanders more than one trillion dollars every year on wars and weapons, a sum that would be more than enough to bring the essentials to all the peoples of the world.

Many Third World countries are finding themselves obliged to seek solutions independently of what happens to the rest; it is like walking on an escalator that is moving in the opposite direction at a higher speed.

What is needed is a genuinely democratic UN and not an imperial fiefdom in which the vast majority of nations count for nothing. The UN, founded before the end of World War II, is exhausted. We should not allow the imposition of the ridiculous role of meeting again in 12 months to be made a mockery of. Let us make our demand felt and save the life of our species before it is too late.

Fidel Castro Ruz
November 1, 2010
5:53 p.m.