A Cuban delegation participated in the Congress and march, raising their voices for socialism, denouncing events in Bolivia and Chile, and strongly condemning neoliberalism. “A Yes for unity, equality, friendship, and freedom among the peoples of America” was the maxim of the delegation in the Congress, where agreements reached at the 25th meeting of the Sao Paulo Forum were discussed. Emphasized in particular was the role of younger generations in building unity of the peoples, formulating proposals, and taking initiative to ensure the peoples’ well-being.

The event’s program included panels and lectures on the role of young people in the construction of socialism; the impact of neoliberalism on our people; and the need to articulate communication strategies to confront media campaigns against progressive processes in Latin America.President Nicolás Maduro is scheduled to address the gathering.

Yesterday, during the march, the Venezuelan president highlighted the commitment of students to the defense of the Bolivarian Revolution’s conquests in education, stating, “We must build a better homeland, to fight against imperialism and for socialism.” he urged youth to make a commitment to the construction of free, quality public education, and to carry forward the legacy of the Bolivarian Revolution to victory.

During the mobilization, participants defended peace and expressed their support for the achievements of Venezuela’s revolutionary process, repudiated the coup in Bolivia, and emphasized their solidarity with the peoples of Palestine and Chile, who are fighting dictatorships sponsored and financed by the U.S. government – causes which were addressed during the Congress, where efforts were focused on coordinating strategies and actions to advocate for the needs of youth across Latin America, and those of the Greater Homeland.

(Granma)

(Transcript – Presidency of the Republic)

(Exclamations of: “Diaz-Canel, for sure, give it to the Yankees!” And “Thank you, Cuba, guarantor of peace!”)

Thanks to all of you.

I think we all agree that there is no better speech than that of the poets. (Laughter), but, well, we have to conduct the closing.

Dear compañero Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba Central Committee;

Compañero, brother, President Nicolás Maduro Moros of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela;

Dear revolutionary leaders from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean;

Brothers and sisters, friends, colleagues:

A special greeting to all who resist and have come to the Cuban capital, which has always been, and will be, a meeting point for those who defend peace and solidarity among peoples.

With the support, enthusiasm, solidarity that you express, feel, and promise, and with Raúl and Maduro, we are giving it to the Yankees. (Applause)

We have just returned from a long, intense journey through European countries, including a visit to Azerbaijan to attend the 18th Non-Aligned Movement Summit.

The Non-Aligned Movement, which was weakened at the end of the Cold War, has retaken the spirit of Bandung, the group’s founding statement. These countries are mobilized by the dramatic course of events and the crisis of multilateralism that today is putting the United Nations system in danger.

There, Cuba strongly condemned this crisis that threatens everyone, but especially the less developed.

We denounced those responsible for this situation and stated: “More lies than ever before are being told, with greater disdain and a more terrible cost to the vast majority of humanity, in the interest of a minority that has taken its luxuries to mind-boggling excesses.

“Well into the 21st century, threats and aggressions of varying degrees are launched against all sovereign governments that refuse to serve the hegemonic power as sites for military bases, hand over resources, or yield to their mandates.”

But we were not the only ones to identify the culprit by name. Several leaders expressed alarm given the return of U.S. hegemonism that threatens and takes brutal action against governments that it considers enemies, because they do not share their policies, and fiercely attacks socialism as if it were an unacceptable social system.

On a global level, there is a great concern given setbacks in important areas such as peace, self-determination, and the sovereignty of nations, the environment, a response to climate change, human rights, social justice, and the search for economic equity.

In our geographical area, in particular, concern is no less widespread. Latin America and the Caribbean suffer the return of the Monroe Doctrine and the worst practices of McCarthyism. The uncontrolled series of interventionist actions that the current U.S. administration has unleashed, since coming to power, is based on these two imperialist postulates.

The President of the United States and his court of hawks attack the Cuban Revolution, the Bolivarian Revolution, the Sandinista Revolution, the Sao Paulo Forum, the political leadership of the Brazilian, Bolivian, Argentine left, and social, popular, progressive movements throughout the region, which they consider their backyard.

The inter-American system has reactivated mechanisms of such odious memory for the region as the Reciprocal Assistance Treaty (TIAR) and the demoralized OAS, which has been consolidated as an instrument of political pressure for the United States and oligarchies that defend neoliberalism.

How can I not laugh at the OAS, if it is such an ugly, ugly thing that makes you laugh (Applause) that is how our parents sang in the years when the group expelled Cuba for not submitting to Washington’s demands. What do we sing to it now, when it could not force Venezuela to its knees, and wants to get rid of a thorn, inspecting Bolivia?

They ran over there, worried about election results in a Latin American nation with the greatest growth and improvement in the last decade, after having been the poorest and most backward in the Southern Cone for centuries.

Yes, the OAS is a very ugly thing. And very cynical. Their “worries” do not touch the depths of anger felt by the people rising up against neoliberalism, faced with pellet guns, gases, and lead bullets for protesting peacefully.

Compañeros:

It is very important to note the media component of this war we are being subjected to. At the forefront of imperial policies, the tanks of the cultural and symbolic offensive are always advancing, intent upon legitimizing the injustices of the capitalist system, discrediting the left’s political alternatives, and destroying the cultural identity of our nations, as a previous step to their destabilization plans.

Just recently, in Azerbaijan, the falsehoods that Washington has sought to impose as pretexts against the legitimate Venezuelan government were debunked.

When Nicolás Maduro Moros, in his capacity as the previous president pro tempore of the Movement, led the first part of the assembly and then presented the responsibility to Azerbaijan, practically all the delegations participating – some 120 at different levels of representation – recognized and congratulated the performance of the Bolivarian Republic at the head of the Non-Aligned Movement. (Applause)

Where was the supposed rejection of Venezuela by the international community? Why was there not a single expression of condemnation or criticism of the Bolivarian government by the governments that represent the absolute majority of the United Nations? Nonetheless, as part of the war of symbols, the media lynching launched against Maduro, the media have reported ad nauseum, in half the planet, that he has no international support.

Internally, they don’t treat any better political leaders who seriously believe a change within the United States is necessary. The discourse is aggressive and dismissive of all those who do not share the approach of the President, who announces decisions that affect millions on Twitter and behaves abhorrently everywhere.

He talks about socialism without the slightest idea of ​​what it means. And orders the end of any process or political program that intends to overcome prevailing injustice, as if he held the course of history in his hands.

He is not the first emperor to try this. And surely he will not be the last to fail. Because history can only be changed by peoples. (Applause)

Fidel said many times that the lie was the main adversary to defeat in politics and that telling the truth is the first duty of every revolutionary. This is one of our fundamental missions as practitioners of revolutionary politics. The first enemy to cut down is the lie and even more so, the imperialist lie. (Applause)

Cuba has been held under siege by lies and for years separated from its natural environment. With lies they have invaded nations, torn apart peoples, set back entire regions on their path to development.

With lies they attacked Iraq and Libya and plunged them into instability. With lies they have turned Syria into a weapons-testing facility and a theater for terrorist operations, which they have financed under the false banners of democracy and freedom.

With colossal, ridiculous lies they accuse Cuba, Venezuela, and the Sao Paulo Forum of promoting popular uprisings in all corners of the planet, while covering their eyes, ears, and mouths, to not see, not hear, not recognize what the people in the streets are shouting: neoliberalism is an economic failure and a social disaster. (Applause)

This technique is used perversely in the desperate attempt to overthrow the Bolivarian government of Venezuela and at the same time hurt Cuba. Although these attacks began in the years of brilliant, successful integration in which Chávez and Fidel created ALBA, in recent months the United States has launched a strong campaign against any type of relationship between our two countries.

We are accused of sustaining the Bolivarian Revolution, in an irrational version of the satellite theory that was wielded against the former Soviet Union, in its time. They resort to this pretext to justify the blockade.

Cuban medical cooperation is a target of continuous attack, intent upon discrediting a noble, solidary effort that the whole world recognizes and that, along with the Latin American School of Medicine and the Henry Reeve Brigade, to respond to natural disasters, constitute the most genuine and successful expressions of cooperation between developing countries. (Applause)

These three projects, works of unquestionable human value, emerged from Fidel’s ideas to honor international solidarity.

There are already more than 400,000 health professionals in Cuba who have provided services in 164 countries. At this moment, more than 29,000 are serving vulnerable populations in 65 nations.

Nothing says so much about the humanist essence of the Cuban Revolution as this cooperation. That is why the effort to disparage and destroy it is not surprising. Solidarity is alien to capitalism.

It was against them and in spite of them, that colonialism and apartheid were defeated in Africa, where the best children of the Cuban Revolution shared sacrifices and their own blood with fighters in Angola, Namibia, and other nations. We brought home from those lands, where empires always traveled to plunder, only our dead (Applause) and the conviction that we had fulfilled “the most sacred of our duties: fighting imperialism wherever it may be,” as Che Guevara taught us.

Defense, education, health, science … Cuban cooperation, the product of solidarity as a principle, was, is, and will be present in any area of ​​noble human activity, where we can contribute. Offering solidarity is re-paying our own debt to humanity. (Applause)

For showing solidarity, and being consistent with our history of struggle and sacrifice, for being a sister and companion of peoples who resist, Cuba is condemned and sanctioned beyond limit.

Our country today suffers a criminal tightening of the blockade, the reinforcement of an immoral, illegal policy that for more than 30 years the United Nations General Assembly has condemned virtually unanimously, without the United States reacting to the worldwide demand.

This is more evidence of disrespect for the norms of international law, which has worsened, especially with an illegal law such as the Helms Burton, which persecutes and sanctions third countries, internationalizing the blockade.

Given that these plots are not enough to defeat a people who have been fighting for independence for 151 years and will never give up, the empire now resorts to harassment, persecution, and sanctions on countries, companies, and ships that participate in transporting fuel to Cuba.

How can someone decree such an action, and then declare that the intention is to isolate the Cuban government and help its people?

Since the time of the famous Mallory Memorandum, Cuba has understood very well, through the words of its very creators, the first and ultimate goal of the blockade.

The U.S. functionary (Lester Mallory) stated: “Most Cubans support Castro…There is no effective political opposition … The only possible way to make the government lose domestic support is by provoking disappointment and discouragement through economic dissatisfaction and hardships …Every possible means should be immediately used to weaken the economic life … denying Cuba funds and supplies to reduce nominal and real salaries with the objective of provoking hunger, desperation and the overthrow of the government.” What maliciousness!

We will never tire of reiterating this, so no one is deceived. The United States policy toward Cuba was made very explicit in that document, dated April 6, 1960.

But before the Mallory Memorandum there are other documents and policies that reveal the historical character of imperial designs regarding Cuba and the rest of Our America. From the theory of “ripe fruit” to the Monroe Doctrine, now reactivated.

Martí saw it more clearly than others and left a warning in his political testament, his unfinished letter of May 18, 1895, in which he reveals the ultimate goal of his struggle to change the island’s fate.

“… I am in danger every day of giving my life for my country and my duty – as I understand it and I have the courage to do so – to prevent in time – with the independence of Cuba – that the United States spreads across the West Indies and falls, with greater force, upon the lands of our America. All I have done thus far, and will do, is for this…”

Through sacrifice, resistance, and thanks to solidarity, our people have maintained their Revolution over all these years. The strength of the process cannot be explained without this popular will. Nor would this will exist without the high level of participation of the people in their destiny.

Thus, it must be stated clearly, the only thing in the aforementioned Mallory document that has not been accomplished is the overthrow of the Cuban government. The punishment imagined by the empire, in the epitome of cruelty, is being applied right now, as if it were a law.

As for solidarity, we have a great deal for which to thank you all, in articulating material support for us and offering the tenderness of your peoples.

And we said today, when Cuba needs the redoubling and multiplication of support for its cause, which is the cause of sovereignty and freedom for the peoples of Our America and the world:

“Truth and tenderness are not useless,” as Martí said. And although sometimes it may appear that things cannot be changed, that policies cannot be defeated, or empires shaken, the history of humanity and the history of the Cuban Revolution are here to prove that it can be done. (Applause)

Cuba is the best demonstration of how much the solidarity of peoples can do. When imperialism pushed us away from Our America, expelling us – for our honor and good fortune – from the discredited OAS, when we were alone in the middle of the hemisphere, upholding the revolutionary banner of a continent in tenacious rebellion, the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples was founded here. (Applause)

It was Fidel’s idea. We were not interested in relationship with governments submissive to the empire, in their ministry of colonies. We were interested and are interested, first of all, in the friendship of the peoples. (Applause)

The friendship of the peoples of America and the world pushed governments. Today Cuba has diplomatic relations with more than 160 countries, and our solidarity has also reached more than half of them.

Many of the political and social leaders gathered here will remember the hemispheric meetings of struggle against the FTAA, promoted by the Comandante en jefe, because they participated in them.

Thus was born the Continental Campaign against the FTAA, which mobilized millions and raised awareness about the need to overcome secondary differences to achieve the unity of all forces and confront that imperialist re-colonization project. And what happened? We defeated it. (Applause)

The defeat of the FTAA, like the historical defense of the Cuban Revolution, are examples of successful struggles that leave us with a great lesson: we cannot succeed split or divided. Working on the basis of all that unites us, we can build common projects to confront imperialist aggression and its oligarchic allies.

Against the blockade we will continue fighting in all arenas. Here, first of all, working, creating, and resisting without giving up on development.

Cuba’s most valuable resource is its people: imaginative, cheerful, enterprising, brave, and creative.

A people who are, first and foremost, the architects of the revolutionary project, under the most adverse conditions.

If we have together chosen the path of socialism, even after the empire imposed the ridiculous theory of the end of history, it is because only with socialism can we achieve social justice and equal rights for all.

Unity around this anti-imperialist and emanicipatory, socialist and solidarity project is the consequence of centuries of struggle for a uniting ideal and confirmation that we owe everything to unity. That’s why they insist on breaking it. That is why millions are allocated for political subversion and the financing of cultural re-colonization projects.

They want to sell us, wrapped in sophisticated silk and tinsel paper, a world that is exploding in a thousand pieces a few steps from our borders, in Our America, where resources have been immorally transferred to transnationals in the era of neoliberalism, the consequences of which we now face.

The formula for its implementation includes convincing the masses that it is the fastest and most effective way to reach prosperity. The blind but omnipotent market, they say, will ensure that those below enjoy the benefits that will spontaneously fall from the horns of plenty in the hands of the elites. What a cruel mockery!

This is how grating inequality was produced, making possible that 1% of society owns more than the remaining 99%.

The extremely powerful advertising and entertainment industry, which moves almost as much money as the weapons or drug businesses, has constructed the myth of access for all to a world of dreams, that one day become nightmares and explode in popular anger.

Then the political vacuum appears. Many parties, competing with marketing techniques for the limited power that the market grants them to manage the leftovers of plunder, reveal the fallacy of democracy that they attempt to impose as a model of freedom. The majority takes government office without real programs of economic and social transformation.

And when movements arise to change the status quo, campaigns to discredit, soft coups, politically motivated court harassment are launched.

All Latin American leaders of the last two decades, who, to some degree, overcame the worst effects of neoliberalism through social and inclusive policies, have been or are being subjected to persecution, accusations, and even unjust imprisonment, such as the undisputed leader of Brazil Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva suffered 19 months ago. Freedom for Lula! We demand from this platform (Applause and exclamations of: “Free Lula!”) Freedom for Lula, now! (Applause)

We live in the communications era. Let us build together, emancipatory platforms to oppose the colonizers with our greatest efforts and energy in pursuit of a better, possible world.

The era of confusion has passed. Our people have paid dearly for the price of economic and political experiments that have only brought wellbeing to elites, in the style of the thug in command of the empire, who believes that the world can be bought and sold on the stock market.

Recent victories of the left in Bolivia and Argentina, the heroic resistance of Venezuela and Cuba to total economic siege, the anti-colonial protests that have put a brake on market formulas show that we cannot be demobilized again.

The left must learn and finally assume the hard lessons of these years of struggle in which splits and lack of unity weakened our forces, and the right unleashed a re-conquest to destroy what had been accomplished.

I note the significant representation of young people in this auditorium and in the streets of Our America, where protest against the abuses of neoliberalism have occurred.

Seeing youth rebelling and fighting for their rights, and for a better fate for their countries, is encouraging and challenging at the same time. (Applause) Because, as Fidel taught us, the struggle of this era is expressed above all in the field of ideas.

We will always defend Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace, proclaimed in Havana in 2014 during the hopeful days of a complete Celac, (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) in decline today.

The mobilizations and peaceful protests with which our peoples are demanding their rights are exemplary. And these rights are being won.

Friends, brothers, compañeros, compañeras:

In your beautiful Declaration of Solidarity with the Cuban Revolution, you have written: “The peoples of the world need the example of Cuba”, and recalled Marti’s statement that maintains its relevance: “Whoever rises today with Cuba rises for all time.” Thanks for saying it and doing it! (Applause and exclamations of: “Cuba yes, blockade no!”)

I express profound gratitude to all those who have come, from near or far, assuming their expenses, to respond to a convocation you yourselves made, to condemn the blockade and articulate efforts that contribute to its definitive defeat.

I especially thank Latin American leaders who have suffered and suffer persecution and punishment for attempting to exchange a history of abuse for the history of our peoples’ liberation.

Today we want to reiterate our strongest support and solidarity with the legitimate president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, (Applause), and the civic-military union of his people, and with Commandante Daniel Ortega Saavedra and the Sandinista National Liberation Front of Nicaragua, also under attack (Applause and exclamations of: Long live Sandino!)

The persistent destabilization attempts that their governments face, are beginning to spread, and we see this today in right-wing efforts to steal the victory of Evo Morales in Bolivia, promoting violence and ignoring the results, in what clearly appears to be the preparation of a coup, which must be denounced (Applause and exclamations of: “They will not pass!)

Thus, we reiterate here our congratulations to Evo for his convincing electoral victory, and to Alberto and Cristina Fernández, who have raised new hope in Argentina. (Applause)

Our solidarity, effective and invariable, with all just causes that are being waged in the region and in the world: with the independence of Puerto Rico (Applause and exclamations of: “Independence for Puerto Rico!”), whose people have managed to keep alive their identity, flag, and hopes for independence, for more than a hundred years of colonialism, an extraordinary symbol of the powerful cultural resistance of Latin America and the Caribbean. Long live free Puerto Rico! (Applause and exclamations of: “Viva!”)

We also support Argentina’s historical demand to recover sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands. (Applause)

We condemn the imperialist intervention against Syria, and with you demand respect for their sovereignty and territorial integrity. (Applause)

We also reaffirm solidarity with the struggles of the Palestinian and Saharawi peoples for the right to self-determination (Applause); with the process of rapprochement and inter-Korean dialogue and for the end of sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea; and with the peace process in Colombia. (Applause)

No just cause is alien to us, and as a nation that owes part of its existence to solidarity, we will never renounce its practice, as a principle. (Applause)

Brothers Sisters:

You have called today for unity among political forces and the social and popular movements of the left, to continue to raise consciousness, generate ideas, and organize for the struggle.

We see this struggle in the battle for the truth. We must defeat the lies on which wars of all kinds against our peoples are launched: informing, persuading, mobilizing, marching with the poor of the earth, who have grown tired of lies and abuse. Proposing and creating programs that respond to the most pressing demands of workers, students, farmers, intellectuals, and artists.

The approved Action Plan confirms that progressive sectors are aware of the urgent need for unity, if we really want to build together an anti-imperialist, emancipatory project, committed to genuine and long delayed integration.

On behalf of Cuba, we would like to reaffirm that the new generation of Cuban leaders, trained and educated by the historical generation of Fidel and Raúl, are revolutionaries, socialists, faithful to Fidel and Martí (Applause), and that we will not yield a millimeter in our positions in favor of independence, sovereignty, and social justice. And joined with the peoples who struggle and resist, we will always uphold solidarity as a fundamental principle, to which we owe so much.

This is why we make our own the words of Fidel, when, more than 50 years ago, referring to the early solidarity that the Revolution found with its cause, he said: “The world has shown solidarity with Cuba and that is why Cuba feels more and more solidarity every day with all the peoples of the world.”

In memory of Fidel and Chávez, two of the greats of Our America, whom we were fortunate to meet, listen to, and follow in the most altruistic practice of solidarity, we look to their work as a guide for the new, challenging times that await us.

I believe we all feel that great avenues are opening up, where free men now walk to build a better society. (Applause and exclamations)

A better world is possible, and urgently necessary! Let us fight for it!

Ever onward to victory!

Greeted with shouts of “Cuba sí, Yankees no” and “Fidel, Fidel, what does Fidel have that the imperialists can’t get to him?” Díaz-Canel began his remarks to representatives of the more than 124 political parties and left movements present. His first words were for Comandante Hugo Chávez Frías, “Cuba’s best friend, son of the Americas who turns 65 today in eternity,” who Fidel loved as a son and placed next to Bolívar and Martí in the battle for the Greater Homeland.

He continued with a profound speech, full of symbolism, denouncing the innumerable malicious actions taken by neoliberal powers. But even this evil is dwarfed – Díaz-Canel insisted – when Our America meets, that is, the diverse, plural, and supportive world of progressive partisan leaders of Latin American and Caribbean, social activists who decided in the dark 1990s to build this unitary organization of the left, today alive and active.

A speech in which the Cuban head of state constantly evoked the ideas of Bolívar and Martí, from whom, he stated, Fidel and Chavez nourished the ideology of our revolutions, adding “Unity and integration were their great obsessions and must also be ours.”

“I know that these are also the obsessions of the Sao Paulo Forum, born of the need for unity and articulation of political parties and popular movements of the left in our region, to confront imperialism and the neoliberal right,” he said.

Díaz-Canel’s words turned again and again to history and its coincidences; to the transcendence of how much has been done in pursuit of integration and unity among our peoples; to the urgent need to further strengthen what unites us within our diversity.

“The São Paulo Forum summons us during an extremely challenging July and here we are, to accompany the heroic Venezuelan resistance and demand an end to the brutal siege that has been imposed on the country. Venezuela is today the anti-imperialist struggle’s primary trench,” he stated, and the audience applauded.

Called upon to play a more leading role in today’s complex political situation, the Sao Paulo Forum faces great challenges, and has much to learn and do for the benefit of our peoples. Because precisely to give hope – recalled the Cuban President – the group was founded by Fidel and Lula, as a valuable instrument for concerted action within diversity.

“Let us not forget for a moment that we are in besieged Caracas,” he said, reaffirming before the world Cuba’s support and solidarity with “legitimate President Nicolás Maduro Moros and the military-civic union that has defeated the worst plans of the enemy so many times.” This is support for the ideals of a people, their fortitude as a nation of Our America.

Imperialism proposes that we betray Venezuela, showing shameless cynicism they resort to blackmail, he said.

“Ignorant of history and the Cuban Revolution’s foreign policy principles, they propose to negotiate a possible reconciliation with us, in exchange for abandoning the course chosen and defended by our people. They suggest betraying friends, throwing 60 years of dignity into the trash bin.

“No, imperialist gentlemen, we do not understand each other,” he insisted.

There could be no better tribute to Chavez than this meeting, where unity was palpable, the great legacy that our heroes bequeathed to us.

The challenge of this event – Díaz-Canel noted – is to finally make a reality of this beautiful alliance of forces. Our America and its people need this; the left of the world demands it.

VENEZUELA IS NOT ALONE

The call for unity was also present in the words of President Maduro, who insisted that unity must become the word of order for our peoples, because only united will we have the strength to win our definitive independence.

With similar emphasis, he denounced the media campaign against Venezuela and its government, recalling that the Bolivarian Revolution emerged as an autochthonous response to the crisis of the imperialist model that had been imposed on the country.

Constant lies and manipulations are wielded against our people – he said – but the people of Venezuela are a courageous people with a democratic culture, with rebel values.

He called for continuous efforts to consolidate unity of the left, which can allow for a great movement for the unification of popular forces.

“Thank you for coming to Venezuela to defend the truth,” he told those present.

Whatever they do, whatever they say, the Bolivarian Revolution will continue to stand firm, Maduro insisted.

What better culmination to close the event, called upon to set the course for the Sao Paulo Forum, a mechanism of integration and struggle for our peoples, and why not, our hopes.

(Granma)

“Respect the peace,” “No coup, no intervention,” “Defend the people’s right to choose their own path,” are just some of the phrases repeated these last few days in Cuba, in workplaces and schools, in agricultural cooperatives and community centers across the country, because Venezuela has committed a sin: standing on its own two feet with its head held high, resisting imperialist pretensions. Venezuelans have committed the sin of being free.

“It is inadmissible that the Yankee government is using the opposition to destroy the great conquests achieved by the Bolivarian Revolution,” Miriam Isaac Reginfo, a technician at Santiago de Cuba’s Architectural Construction Enterprise No. 57, told Granma.

She worked for three years in the sister country as an inspector for the housing mission, in the state of Miranda, and recalls the thousands of buildings she saw erected in the five municipalities she covered, all for needy families, including many who lost their homes in landslides.
“All of this is at risk now,” she said, along with programs devoted to education, sports, culture, science, food production, the environment and economic development – so hated by the U.S. government because they are no longer permitted to plunder the country’s riches as they once did.

“Therefore, as stated in the Revolutionary Government statement, which we have just supported with our signatures, we will do whatever is necessary. Today dignity and action are required, because just as Fidel said that after Girón, all the peoples of Latin America were a little more free, if the example of Venezuela is lost, that freedom will be endangered.

“We will never leave Venezuela alone,” she emphasized, “and I think that the world will not abandon it to fate either, because the bloodbaths and the retreat of history, to which U.S. military interventions have always led, supported by a few puppet governments, cannot be the destiny of the children of Simón Bolívar.”

María Cristina Díaz Montalván, a shopkeeper in the Villa Clara neighborhood of Sabino Hernández, insisted that these are times in which unity is needed to preserve the sovereignty and independence of the sister nation.
Likewise, Elías René Pérez Molina and Florencio Altunaga López, delegates to the XXI Congress of the Cuban Workers Federation (CTC), condemned U.S. aggression, which is directed toward seizing Venezuela’s natural resources and putting an end to Latin American unity, they said.

“If they think we are going to sit idly, they are wrong,” said Digna Morales Molina, director of the Commerce and Gastronomy Enterprise in Villa Clara, and recalled José Martí’s phrase: “Give me a way to serve Venezuela: she has in me a son,” an idea repeated today by millions of Cubans and honest citizens of the world, who know very well what it would mean for this nation to lose its independence.

IN CONTEXT
President Donald Trump delivered an offensive speech in Miami, reiterating the threat of military aggression against Venezuela.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez said it is time to take a stand, beyond political differences, in defense of peace, and emphasized that the humanitarian aid issue is being used as a pretext to launch a war for oil.
Trump has violated Venezuela’s sovereignty, by recognizing a puppet president invented in Washington, the minister tweeted.

Rodriguez noted that Trump has added McCarthyism to the Monroe Doctrine and has reiterated that all options are open. “The danger of military aggression is real. The history of Our America has demonstrated this.”

(Granma)

Between February 6 and 10 of 2019, several military transport aircraft have flown to the Rafael Miranda Airport in Puerto Rico, the San Isidro Air Base in the Dominican Republic, and other strategically located Caribbean Islands, most certainly without the knowledge of the governments of those nations. These flights took off from U.S. military facilities where Special Operation Troops and U.S. Marine Corps units operate. These units have been used for covert operations, even against leaders of other countries.

Media and political circles – including within the U.S. – have revealed that extremist figures of the government with a long history of actions and slander aimed at causing or instigating wars, such as John Bolton, U.S. National Security Advisor; and Mauricio Claver-Carone, Director of the National Security Council’s Office of Western Hemisphere Affairs, counting on the connivance of Marco Rubio, Senator of the anti-Cuban mafia in Florida, designed, directly and thoroughly organized, and funded, from their posts in Washington, the attempted coup d’etat in Venezuela by means of the illegal self-proclamation of a President.

They are the same individuals who, either personally or through the State Department, have been exerting brutal pressures on numerous governments to force them to support the arbitrary call for new Presidential elections in Venezuela, while promoting recognition for the usurper who barely won 97,000 votes as a parliamentarian, against the more than 6 million Venezuelans who elected Constitutional President Nicolás Maduro Moros last May.

After the resistance mounted by the Bolivarian and Chavista people against the coup, evidenced by the mass demonstrations in support of President Maduro, and the loyalty of the National Bolivarian Armed Forces, the U.S. government has intensified its international political and media campaign, and strengthened unilateral economic coercive measures against Venezuela, among them the freezing of Venezuelan funds in third countries banks, worth billions of dollars, and the theft of the this sister nation’s oil revenue, causing serious humanitarian damage and harsh deprivation to its people.
In addition to this cruel and unjustifiable plunder, the U.S. intends to fabricate a humanitarian pretext in order to launch a military attack on Venezuela and, by resorting to intimidation, pressure, and force, is seeking to introduce into this sovereign nation’s territory alleged humanitarian aid – which is one thousand times inferior as compared to the economic damages provoked by the siege imposed by Washington .

The usurper and self-proclaimed “President” shamelessly announced his disposition to call for a U.S. military intervention under the pretext of receiving the aforementioned humanitarian aid, and has described the sovereign and honorable rejection of that maneuver as a crime against humanity.

High-ranking U.S. officials have been arrogantly and blatantly reminding us all, day after day, that when it comes to Venezuela, “all options are on the table, including military action.”

In the process of fabricating pretexts, the U.S .government has resorted to deception and slanders, presenting a draft resolution at the UN Security Council which, cynically and hypocritically expresses deep concern for the human rights and humanitarian situation…, the recent attempts to block the delivery of humanitarian aid, the millions of Venezuelan refugees and migrants, the excessive use of force against peaceful protesters, the breakdown of regional peace and security in Venezuela, and calls for taking the necessary steps.

It is obvious that the United States is paving the way to forcibly establish a humanitarian corridor under international supervision, invoke the obligation to protect civilians and take all necessary steps.

It is worth recalling that similar behaviors and pretexts were used to by the U.S. during the prelude to wars it launched against Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Libya, which resulted in tremendous human losses and caused enormous suffering.

The U.S. government attempts to remove the biggest obstacle – the Bolivarian and Chavista Revolution – to imperialist domination of Our America and deprive the Venezuelan people of the largest certified oil reserves on the planet and numerous strategic natural resources.
It is impossible to forget the sad and painful history of U.S. military interventions perpetrated more than once in Mexico, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, Honduras, and most recently Grenada and Panama.

As was warned by Army General Raúl Castro Ruz on July 14, 2017, “The aggression and coup violence against Venezuela harm all of Our America and only benefit the interests of those set on dividing us in order to exercise their control over our peoples, unconcerned about causing conflicts of incalculable consequences in this region, like those we are seeing in different parts of the world.”

History will severely judge a new imperialist military intervention in the region and the complicity of those who might irresponsibly support it.
What is at stake today in Venezuela is the sovereignty and dignity of Latin America and the Caribbean and the peoples of the South. Equally at stake is the survival of the rule of International Law and the UN Charter. What is being defined today is whether the legitimacy of a government emanates from the express and sovereign will of its people, or from the recognition of foreign powers.

The Revolutionary Government calls for an international mobilization in defense of peace in Venezuela and the region, based on the principles established in the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace, which was adopted by heads of state and government of CELAC in 2014.

It likewise welcomes and supports the Montevideo Mechanism, an initiative promoted by Mexico, Uruguay, the Caribbean Commonwealth (CARICOM), and Bolivia, which seeks to preserve peace in Venezuela based on the principles of non-interference in the internal affairs of states, legal equality of states, and the peaceful resolution of conflicts, as stated in its recent declaration.

It welcomes the positive consideration given to this initiative by President Maduro Moros and the international community, and expresses its concern given the U.S. government’s categorical rejection of the dialogue initiatives promoted by several countries, including this one.

The Revolutionary Government reiterates its firm and unwavering solidarity with Constitutional President Nicolás Maduro Moros, the Bolivarian Chavista Revolution and the civic and military unity of its people, and calls upon all peoples and governments of the world to defend peace and mount a joint opposition, over and above political or ideological differences, to a new imperialist military intervention in Latin America and the Caribbean, which will damage the independence, sovereignty and interests of all peoples from the Rio Bravo to Patagonia.

Havana, February 12, 2019.

We are today living a historical moment. In these coming days, the future of our countries will be defined, as one of war or peace. Your national representatives in Washington want to bring to your borders the same hatred that they sowed in Vietnam. They want to invade and intervene in Venezuela – they say, as they said then – in the name of democracy and freedom. But this is not so. The story of the usurpation of power in Venezuela is as false as the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. It is a false case, but it can have dramatic consequences for our entire region.

Venezuela is a country that, by virtue of its 1999 Constitution, has broadly expanded the participatory and protagonistic democracy of the people, and in an unprecedented manner, is one of the countries with the largest number of electoral processes held over the last 20 years. You might not like our ideology or our appearance, but we exist and we are millions.

I address these words to the people of the United States of America to warn of the seriousness and danger of some sectors in the White House considering an invasion of Venezuela with unpredictable consequences for my country and for the entire American region. President Donald Trump also intends to disrupt the noble dialogue initiatives promoted by Uruguay and Mexico, with the support of CARICOM, for a peaceful solution and dialogue in favor of Venezuela. We know that, for the good of Venezuela, we must sit down and talk because to refuse to dialogue is to choose the path of force. Keep in mind the words of John F. Kennedy: “Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.”Are those who do not want to dialogue afraid of the truth?

The political intolerance towards the Venezuelan Bolivarian model and the appetite for our immense oil resources, minerals, and other great riches, has prompted an international coalition headed by the U.S. government to commit the serious insanity of militarily attacking Venezuela, under the false pretext of a non-existent humanitarian crisis.

The people of Venezuela have suffered painful social wounds caused by a criminal commercial and financial blockade, which has been aggravated by the seizing and theft of our financial resources and assets in countries aligned with this demented onslaught.

And yet, thanks to a new system of social protection, of direct attention to the most vulnerable sectors, we proudly continue to be a country with one of the highest human development indices and with lowest inequality in the Americas.

The U.S. people must know that this complex multifaceted aggression is carried out with total impunity and in clear violation of the United Nations Charter, which expressly rejects the threat or use of force, among other principles and purposes for the sake of peace and friendly relations between Nations.

We want to continue being business partners of the people of the United States, as we have been throughout our history. Their politicians in Washington, on the other hand, are willing to send their sons and daughters to die in an absurd war, instead of respecting the sacred right of the Venezuelan people to self-determination and to safeguard our sovereignty.

Like you, people of the United States, we Venezuelans are patriots. And we shall defend our homeland with every piece of our soul. Today Venezuela is united in a single clamor: we demand the end of aggression that seeks to suffocate our economy and socially suffocate our people, as well as the end of serious and dangerous threats of military intervention against Venezuela. We appeal to the good soul of U.S. society, a victim of its own leaders, to join our call for peace, let us be all one people against warmongering and war.

Long live the peoples of America!

Nicolás Maduro

President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

Also on hand was the President of Cuba’s Councils of State and Ministers, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, who tweeted upon his arrival “Cuba defends and supports Venezuelan sovereignty and Bolivarian integration.”

Leaders from more than 120 nations have expressed support for Maduro on the occasion and some 90 sent delegations to the swearing-in ceremony for his second term in office.

(Granma)

Cuba’s Foreign Ministry shared an excerpt from the Summit’s Final Declaration on Twitter: We reiterate our willingness to continue promoting the construction of a new international order, democratic, fair, inclusive and equitable, in which sovereign equality between states is the norm.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega noted that U.S. interventionist policies toward Venezuela, Bolivia, and Cuba are criminal acts against humanity.

In particular, he mentioned the intensification of the economic, commercial, and financial blockade of Cuba, despite the many resolutions approved by the vast majority of members of the United Nations General Assembly demanding its elimination.

He said that the celebration of this Summit on the 14th anniversary of ALBA-TCP reaffirms the value of solidarity throughout the years of struggle for justice and peace.

He insisted that the Nicaraguan people “have the strength and dignity to overcome the sanctions they face, despite the threats. We are sure that the Venezuelan and Cuban revolutions will remain undefeated in this difficult conjuncture, with the accompaniment of the peoples of ALBA-TCP and the world.”He concluded paying tribute to Fidel and Chávez, “to those two great gladiators of peace and justice.”

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel adjourns the meeting.

A gala event is scheduled this evening to commemorate the 14th anniversary of ALBA’s founding.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega Saavedra is the final leader to address the Summit this afternoon.

Speaking next was José Luis Merino, El Salvador’s deputy minister of Foreign Affairs, who said that ALBA has been the most vigorous, energetic alliance seen in the region over the last 14 years.

“Without the ALBA, our people would be facing a huge social battle, in which thousands of Latin American patriots would be dying.

“We are living amidst U.S. attacks meant to prevent the Salvadoran people from advancing.”

David Choquehuanca Céspedes, ALBA-TCP secretary, speaks, saying, “At heart all human beings are integrationists.

“That is what we must awaken in ALBA member countries, communal energy to defend our sovereignty, our dignity, and our identity, necessary to strengthen our joint work.

“We need to bring light to international spaces, express our ideas and proposals, work on the rights of Mother Earth, on the protection of the environment.

“We need to activate mechanisms of our alliance, strengthen missions and social exchange, consolidate the Economic Council, designate the country that will coordinate this mechanism, work on a new financial architecture, build new economic thinking, work on a meeting of intellectuals, of communication ministers.

“Work on mechanisms of cooperation, ALBA has served as a cooperation mechanism with Russia, China, Iran, and Turkey. There is interest on the part of governments to work with ALBA. Social movements are also interested in working with us.

“We must become the spirit of integration of the peoples of the world,” he insisted.

A representative from St. Kitts and Nieves and Suriname’s ambassador in Cuba, Marciano Edgar, addressed the Summit.

Chet Greene, Antigua and Barbuda’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, International Trade and Immigration, took the floor, sharing remarks from the country’s Prime Minister, Gaston Browne, who expressed gratitude to ALBA, President Maduro and Venezuela, and noted that many of the integration objectives formulated in the Managua declaration have been met.

The issue of protecting our sovereignty and self-determination remains relevant today, he said, adding that all countries of the region are being besieged and threatened with economic terrorism.

Grenada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Peter David, spoke and expressed his solidarity with Venezuela.

“Grenada will always appreciate the support it has received from the people and government of Cuba.”

(Granma)

“First I want to recall that 24 years ago, at this very same time that I am landing, Comandante Chávez arrived with all his dreams and energy. It was 1994, and also a December 13, and Fidel was waiting for him here,” Maduro noted.

“No one knew, nor did anyone imagine, the story that was to be written, for our continent,” he added, moments after being greeted on the tarmac by Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla.

Arriving yesterday, as well, during the day, were Dominica’s Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit; Foreign Minister Chet Greene of Antigua and Barbuda; the ambassador of Haiti in Venezuela, Lesly David; and Raúl Licausi, Venezuelan deputy foreign minister. All were received by José Ramón Saborido, Cuba’s Minister of Higher Education.

(Granma)

The President assured on his Twitter account, this past August 20, that this step represents “a turning point” for Venezuela, adding, “We are going to dismantle neoliberal capitalism’s perverse war and install a virtuous, balanced, healthy, and productive economy.”

Granma approaches several aspects that allow us to understand the process:

What are the objectives of the reconversion?

This monetary policy involves the taking of corrective action to address factors that distort the economy, like inflation, monetary liquidity, the reduction of buying power, and others, allowing for the creation of conditions to reduce vulnerability to elements that destabilize a nation’s economy.

Thus the currency is transformed to a new scale, with fewer zeroes, without losing buying power.

According to the Venezuelan President, this process will contribute to defending the national currency from financial attacks perpetuated by pro-imperialist sectors.

What is the Bolívar Soberano and what is its relation to the petro?

Spearheading the process is beginning circulation of the Bolívar Soberano (Bs.S.) and the creation of a new monetary cone which includes a new series of five cent and one bolivar coins, as well as bills in the denominations of 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, and 500 bolivars.

The Bs.S. has five fewer zeroes as compared to the bolivar, with which it will coexist to provide change and conduct small transactions. The Bs.S. is anchored to the Petro, that is, backed by the country’s oil deposits. According to the announcement, the new bills (2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200, and 500) are in the hands of public and private banks.

Thus, the supply of Bs.S. in circulation is subject to the volume of petros available and will act as a conversion till, linked to the supply or price of Venezuelan oil. Every unit of the cryptocurrency is equivalent to 3,600 Bs.S. and will be the referent used to set wages and prices of consumer goods and services, as one of the accounting units that will be utilized in the Bolivarian nation.

Prior to the beginning of the process, authorities at the Central Bank of Venezuela assured delivery and safeguarding of the new bills in the country’s banks, and reiterated that new and old bills will coexist until to further notice, as the latter gradually disappear.

The existence of a new monetary cone will allow for progress in addressing the shortage of cash in Venezuela – above all a result of contraband activities extracting bills to countries like Colombia – which has led to the posting of two prices in many stores: one for electronic transactions and another for paper money.

What other measures support the reconversion?
A new system of fair prices was announced August 21, to ensure that Venezuelans basic basket of food items be priced below half a petro, a formula described by President Maduro as “revolutionary,” putting work at the center the general re-balancing of society, in addition to the production of goods and salary compensation.

“With this we will put a definitive end to the perverse model that dollarized prices in the country,” he emphasized.

Additionally planned as part of the reconversion is a new design of fiscal and tax policies; a new gasoline subsidy policy; a four percent increase in value-added taxes; and the establishment of a single rate of currency exchange, which will fluctuate as regulated by the Central Bank
The President called on the people to defend the stability of prices on the street “with consciousness,” and, on his official Facebook page, expressed his gratitude for the people’s support and untiring work that allowed the monetary and economic reconversion to be carried out.

At the end of the first day of the process, Executive Vice President Delcy Rodríguez reported on Venezuelan Television Channel 8 that shortly after the opening of the electronic banking platform, where transactions with the Bolivar Soberano are managed, some 400,000 operations at different points had already been completed. “The Recovery Program is the way to win the war,” she reiterated.

(Granma)