Morales participated in the celebrations for the 60th anniversary of the founding of the town of Mineros, in the eastern department of Santa Cruz, and used the occasion to talk about the COB strike meant to force the government to change the current Law of Retirement.

The head of state asked “those small groups from the Bolivian Workers Union to defend the majority of workers and not just the privileged,” referring to the demand to raise miners’ retirement to 8,000 bolivianos ($1,147) with a raise to 5,000 ($ 717) for other sectors.

The president said that “the entire State treasury cannot be invested in State salaries or pensions” and stressed that priority should be given to the country’s growth through investment that will allow for the democratic distribution of economic resources.

Bolivia’s first indigenous president has called for dialogue on several occasions since demonstrations started at the beginning of last week.

Some analysts and government representatives said that certain leaders of the workers organization are simply campaigning to win supporters with the intention of launching the COB as a political party in next year’s general elections.

The latest to warn about the political interests of the COB leaders were Interior Minister Carlos Romero, and Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs and Police Jorge Perez.

Both men said that there are marked political interests behind the protests, which began tepidly on Monday last week and have been gaining strength daily.

“Until they all are here we must continue fighting (…) They will resist, they will not yield,” Rene told the reporters after beginning the procedures to renounce his citizenship at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, accompanied by his lawyer Philip Horowitz.

The anti-terrorist fighter was detained in 1998 along with Gerardo Hernandez, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez, and Ramon Labañino, for monitoring terrorist groups that organized, financed and executed actions from Miami that have killed more than 3,300 Cubans.

As Rene told national and foreign reporters, once he has resolved “this affair of the supervised release,” he will look for a way to join the global campaign “to correct this injustice so they can return to be with us.”

We need to reach U.S. society with that campaign, he said, so that the Americans are made aware of the case of the Five and their mission in the northern territory to protect human lives from terrorism.

Last week, Judge Joan Lenard accepted the request made by the anti-terrorist fighter to modify the terms of his supervised release and remain in Cuba, in exchange for his renunciation of U.S. citizenship.

After serving his sentence in October 2011, Rene was forced to remain in the United States for three additional years under supervised release, something lawyers and human rights defenders described as an additional punishment.

Regarding the procedure begun for his renunciation of U.S. citizenship, the anti-terrorist fighter told Prensa Latina that this is barely the beginning of the legal process to remain in his homeland, as a modification of the terms of his supervised release.

“The order from Judge Joan Lenard that I can be in Cuba if I renounce my U.S. citizenship is not the end of the matter,” he said, “because there are further things to be done,” he said.

In his exchange with national and foreign reporters accredited in Cuba, Rene thanked Cubans for their solidarity and said he was happy to be back in the Caribbean country, “joining the society to which I belong.”

The Syrian army is strong and ready to defend its borders, but if we can assist them in the training sector, we will, noted Iranian Commander of Land Forces General Ahmad Reza Pourdestan.

Iran faces threats of a terrible magnitude attack by Israel, whose authorities affirm the Persian nuclear development program has military ends, in spite of the fact that inspections conducted by the International Atomic Energy Organization has found no evidence that proves the accusations.

The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction was signed in 1993 and came into effect in April 1997.

In his message for this day, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon noted that the shadow of chemical weapons has appeared again amid recent allegations about their alleged use in Syria.

Ban Ki-moon noted that the 1997 Convention paved the way for the elimination of chemical weapons and for moving forward in the peaceful use of chemistry, while signing states demonstrated their insistence that these events never occur again.

The destruction of nearly 80 percent of the arsenals of that type has been verified.

However, the secretary regretted the fact that Egypt, Angola, Syria, Somalia, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Israel, Myanmar and South Sudan have not joined the Convention so far, and urged them to ratify the document.

One hundred delegates from 20 countries attend the event in Havana, which should approve the draft proposal of the 19th annual meeting of the Forum, to be held from July 31 to August 4 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

The Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), founder and member of the Working Group, will propose the participants to discuss the document “The need for the unity of the left in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

Delegates will learn about the updating of the Cuban socialist model, particularly the implementation of the resolutions of the 6th Congress of the PCC about this issue.

According to the event’s organizers, the structural crisis of the capitalist system and a plan of solidarity with the Bolivarian process in Venezuela will be issues under discussion.

Prior to the meeting, Jose Ramon Balaguer, member of the Secretariat and head of the International Relations department of the PCC, received here the Forum’s executive secretary Valter Pomar.

Pomar is also a member of the national leadership of the Workers’ Party (PT) of Brazil, driving force along with other parties of this left and progressive parties group of the continent.

According to Granma newspaper, he was received at the airport by Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla, member of the Politburo and Minister of Foreign Affairs.

The Venezuelan President is attending the 13th Intergovernmental Committee Meeting Cuba-Venezuela, being held since yesterday here.

The meeting is led by the Vice-President of the Council of Ministers for the Territorial Development and Minister of Oil and Mining of Venezuela, Rafael Ramirez and by the Minister of Foreign Trade and Investment in Cuba, Rodrigo Malmierca.

Summoned by the Cuban United Nations Association (ACNU), the forum will open with the introduction of four panelists from the Cuban Women’s Federation, the National Union of Lawyers, the National Union of Writers and Artists, and the National Council of Churches.

In statements to Prensa Latina, ACNU General Director Soraya Alvarez said that those entities play an important role in the education and defense of human rights in the Caribbean country.

According to Alvarez, the online debate forum also supports the report Cuba will present in Geneva, Switzerland on May 1, as part of the Universal Periodic Review of the United Nations Council, which examines the human rights situation in all U.N. member states.

The report includes all of Cuba’s achievements and plans in areas such as access to healthcare, education, culture, sports, social security, freedom of religion, treatment of prisoners, gender equality, and assistance to children.

René is being held on U.S. soil for three years of supervised release, despite having served his sentence, and following the death of his father, Candido Gonzalez, he asked for permission to the Court for the Southern District of Florida to be with his family.

Gerardo Hernandez, Ramon Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando Gonzalez and Rene Gonzalez were arrested in 1998 for monitoring Miami-based terrorist groups planning actions against Cuba, and received their sentences with no evidence of the charges imputed.

While René is under supervised release, the other four remain in prison with long sentences, including Hernandez’s two life sentences plus 15 years.

According to the official note released today in the press, his trip to Cuba was approved under strict conditions by Judge Joan Lenard, who from the beginning has been on the case of the Five, as they are known internationally.

In this sense, René had to give the authorities the detailed itinerary of his stay in the Caribbean island, data on his location and contact information here in the country.

Besides, adds the note, he must get in contact, by telephone, with his probation officer while in Cuba and return to the U.S. within the period prescribed.

This is the second visit of Rene to the island after finishing his sentence.

The first one was in 2012, under the same conditions, to see his brother Roberto, who was seriously ill and died several months later.

The blockade has a high cost to the small Caribbean country, as it affects trade, investment and financial transactions, Vandepitte told Prensa Latina after speaking at a conference on the Cuban economy at the Palais de Nations.

At the conference, the Belgian expert gave an overview of the situation since before the triumph of the Revolution, its relations with the socialist bloc, the Special Period, and the current stage, where Cuba is updating its economic and social model.

Vandepitte explained how despite being a blockaded country for more than 50 years, Cuba has achieved indicators superior to those of many other countries, including industrialized nations, according to data provided by the United Nations Program for Development and other international entities.

The report that Cuba will present at the Universal Periodic Review at the Human Rights Council points out that the country has already achieved many of the UN Millennium Development Goals.

In 2012, Cuba’s infant mortality rate was 4.6 per 1,000 births, the lowest in Latin America, and maternal mortality stood at 21.5 per 100,000 deliveries, among the lowest in the world.

Regarding education, Cuba ranks 14th worldwide in the Education for All Development Index.

These results have been possible in Cuba, despite its being blockaded, because the government prioritizes the welfare of the population, said Vandepitte.

Cuba’s Geneva-based ambassador to international organizations, Anayansi Rodriguez, members of the diplomatic corps and delegations from a number of countries represented here, attended the conference at U.N. headquarters here.

That is why we come to you, first black President in U.S., awarded Nobel Peace Prize, and we ask you to act toward this case and assume a position that can not be other than release them immediately, because they must never be behind bars, says the letter.

The sample of solidarity with Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González and René González was presented in the Main Lecture Hall of the almost three hundred year old university during the final day of the VIII Congress of the Federation of University Students (FEU).

The Five-as they are internationally known- were arrested in 1998 for monitoring groups that organized, financed and executed violent actions against Cuba from Miami, which have left in the island over 3 300 dead and about 2 000 injured.

Through the letter, the students of the University of Havana remind Obama that Gerardo, Ramón, Antonio, Fernando and René were in the United States to ensure peace in Cuba and other nations of the world, including his.

The activities carried out in your country had the aim of protecting people from terrorists actions planned by anti-Cuban extremist groups based in Miami, specified in the text.

The letter to the U.S. president also reflects that the case against the Five was marked by illegalities, such as filing charges that were not proven at trial and that Washington paid reporters hired to facilitate convictions.

For the University of Havana students, Obama must use the powers he has and put an end to that injustice.

In the text, the students assure that they will continue fighting for the return of Gerardo, Ramon, Antonio, Fernando and Rene, the first four in U.S. prisons, while Rene was forced to remain in U.S. soil for three years under supervised released, after fulfilling his sentence.