The First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Central Committee, Army General Army Raul Castro Ruz, sent a floral tribute to honor Frank Pais Garcia on the 63rd anniversary of his brutal assassination, placed alongside his tomb, during the people of Santiago’s customary commemoration every July 30, Martyrs of the Revolution Day.

Central Committee members and leaders of the Provincial Defense Council, Lázaro Expósito Canto and Beatriz Johnson Urrutia, presided the events in the city’s patrimonial Santa Ifigenia Cmetery, with the participation of other representatives of the Party, government, the Young Communist League, mass organizations, the Revolutionary Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior.

Floral wreaths from Army General Raul Castro, President of the Republic Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, National Assembly of People’s Power President Esteban Lazo Hernández, and the people of Cuba, were placed before the pantheon of July 26th Martyrs.

Dedicated to all the many martyrs, Díaz-Canel tweeted a heartfelt message: “July 30, a sad day in the memory of Cuba. Frank País and Raúl Pujol were murdered in Santiago de Cuba. The rebellious city wears the 26th and sings the Bayamo anthem. Today is Martyrs’ Day. Glory to those who had only their young, promising lives, and gave them for the homeland.”

(Source: Granma)

Before the simple tomb of the País García family, in honor of the 62nd anniversary of the murders of Frank and Raúl Pujol, Raúl joined the people of Santiago de Cuba for a special moment recalling the young hero.

Accompanied by Beatriz Johnson Urrutia, a Council of State vice president and president of the Provincial Assembly of People’s Power, the Army General paid his respects to José Martí, laying flowers beside the crypt that holds his remains and then made his way to the giant boulder where Fidel´s ashes lie, depositing a white rose in a simple gesture honoring his brother, the leader of the Cuban Revolution.

(Granma)

Upon choosing this date to bury the remains of our internationalist heroes who fell in different parts of the world, mainly in Africa, from where Maceo’s ancestors and a good part of our blood come, December 7 has become as an occasion to remember all Cubans who gave their lives not only in defense of the homeland, but of humanity as well. In this way, patriotism and internationalism, two of the most beautiful values that man has been able to create, are joined forever in Cuba’s history.

There are historical events that no one can erase. There are revolutionary examples that men and women of future generations, within and beyond our country, will not be able to forget.

Cuban Communists, and millions of revolutionary combatants that make up the ranks of our heroic and combative people, will know how to fulfill the role that history assigns us, not only as the first socialist state in the Western Hemisphere, but also as unwavering defenders in the front line of the noble cause of the world’s humble and exploited.

We have never aspired to be awarded the glorious flags and principles that the revolutionary movement has defended throughout its heroic, beautiful history, but if destiny were to assign us the role, one day, of remaining among the last defenders of socialism in a world in which the Yankee empire managed to embody Hitler’s dreams of dominating the world, we would know how to defend this bulwark to the last drop of our blood.

These men and women, to whom we now give an honorable burial in the warm earth where they were born, died for the most sacred values ​​of our history and our Revolution … May we be capable of following their example!- Source: Speech delivered in the memorial service for internationalists killed during the performance of honorable military and civilian missions, held in El Cacahual, December 7, 1989.

(Granma)