Anti-Imperialist Unity Is the Tactic and Strategy of Victory
- Cuban President Miguel
Díaz-Canel -
Speech delivered at the virtual Meeting
of Leaders in celebration of the 30th anniversary of the founding of
the São Paulo Forum on July 28. Also participating in the
meeting were President Nicolás Maduro of the Bolivarian
Republic of Venezuela, President Daniel Ortega and Vice-President
Rosario Murillo of Nicaragua and Monica Valente, Executive Secretary of
the São Paulo Forum as moderator.
Dear Nicolas, Daniel, Rosario and Monica,
Brothers and sisters of the political forces
following this videoconference with interest:
I am accompanied by compañero
José Ramón Machado Ventura, second secretary of
our Party Central Committee, and compañero Bruno
Rodríguez, Foreign Minister of the Republic of Cuba and
member of our Political Bureau.
Thank you, Daniel, for your words; thank you,
Maduro, for your words, for the book and the beautiful video about
Chávez.
Thirty years ago, doomsayers of despair,
enthusiasts of the market, advocates of a single thought, would have
the world believe that history had ended.
And here we are, the intransigent defenders of
hope and another possible world, celebrating 30 years of an embrace
that is now history.
Today we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the
São Paulo Forum, an idea born from the political genius of
Fidel and an exceptional protagonist of this unifying accomplishment:
Brother Lula, former President and leader of the Brazilian and Latin
American left.
Fidel Castro Ruz and Luiz Inácio Lula
da Silva.
When the Soviet Union and the socialist camp in
Eastern Europe collapsed and their gravediggers set out to bury the
emancipatory ideas of the left on this side of the world, the creation
of the São Paulo Forum provided a sharp shove to a ship that
seemed to be drifting.
The revolutionary, progressive and democratic
political forces of Latin America and the Caribbean converged in this
organization of legitimate consensus to construct unity of the left for
the emancipation and integration of our peoples, challenging the Monroe
Doctrine and its allies on the continent.
The march of history could not be stopped.
Socialist ideals have reared their heads in the empire's backyard with
their own personality and strength, and today it is only right to
recognize compañero Lula and the leaders
of Brazil's Workers' Party for their performance leading the Executive
Secretariat of the São Paulo Forum.
This celebration also allows us to thank the
São Paulo Forum for their unwavering support to the Cuban
people and especially the solidarity campaign, undertaken this year,
calling for an end to the blockade against Cuba.
This virtual meeting is taking place on the 66th
birthday of a dear friend of Cuba, who Fidel described as the best
friend of Cuba and of all peoples who struggle, Comandante Hugo Rafael
Chávez Frías, who at the São Paulo
Forum in 2012 invited us to lay "the cornerstone of South American,
Latin American, Caribbean and world liberation, without fear."
The invincible example of Chávez now
summons us to continue the struggle, with firmness and optimism,
convinced that there are no obstacles, however difficult they may seem,
that our peoples, united, cannot overcome, as Venezuela, Nicaragua and
Cuba demonstrate today.
"Doctors, not bombs," Fidel said one day,
responding to the ridiculous imperial pretension of subjugating peoples
with wars and threats of intervention against 60 or more "dark corners
of the world."
And today we are witnessing the confirmation of
his words, amidst the most complex human drama on the planet in real
time.
Not even the most powerful and sophisticated
weapons have been able to stop the new coronavirus pandemic. On the
contrary, now the true, anti-human essence of capital has become more
visible and more terrifying, with its insistence on the market and its
uncontrolled rise under ruthless neo-liberal policies: governments that
are helplessly witnessing the collapse of their health systems, unable
to save millions of lives, even those that were thought to be out of
danger in the chaotic, brutal northern empire that despises us.
The region of the Americas is today sadly the
epicenter of the pandemic. The neo-liberal policies of many
governments, bent on placing the market above human lives, make it
impossible to predict the moment when a definitive control of the
disease will be possible. The spread of the virus is a fact, if we
consider that the first million cases were confirmed over 96 days, but
the latest million were counted within only 16. Neo-liberal paradigms
have fallen into absolute disrepute. Whether their credulous followers
like it or not, the history of their economic experiment is about to
end, or human existence will be further compromised.
Despite the indisputable emergency the pandemic
has created for everyone, the United States government has not desisted
in its hegemonic plans for the region, reactivating the Monroe Doctrine
and McCarthyism, escalating interference, threatening the use of force,
and promoting a policy of legal attacks on leftist and progressive
leaders and organizations.
While thousands die every day within the empire's
territory, the current tenant of the White House maintains continuous
pressure on governments that are not to their liking, while receiving
support from regional lackeys who operate in their interests.
Of particular concern, within this deplorable
scenario, are imperialism's interventionist actions in violation of
international law against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, which
we condemn and reject with the same vehemence with which we reaffirm
our solidarity with legitimate President brother Nicolás
Maduro Moros and the civic-military union that sustains the country's
sovereignty.
We also reiterate our solidarity with the
Sandinista government and people, led by Comandante Daniel Ortega, and
reject unilateral coercive measures that threaten the peace,
well-being, justice and development of the Nicaraguan people.
We reaffirm, once again, our strict adherence to
the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace,
signed by the Latin American and Caribbean heads of state and
government in January of 2014, in Havana, and confirm our unwavering
commitment to the eradication of colonialism until the debt to the
peoples still living under colonial status is settled.
Dear brothers and sisters:
I speak on behalf of a sovereign, revolutionary
and solidary Cuba, which will never allow itself to be subjugated,
either by seduction or by force: the homeland of Martí,
Fidel and Raúl.
I am speaking on behalf of a heroic and noble
people who for 60 years have resisted the most cruel and genocidal of
blockades, an economic, commercial and financial siege by the world's
greatest power, intensified as we battle the pandemic, with relentless,
perverse persecution, insisting on a plan to force us to surrender with
hunger and hardship.
Under the leadership of the Party, the government
of our small, blockaded nation, along with political, mass and social
organizations and our people, has controlled and is defeating COVID-19,
without over-confidence.
This victory, which includes our commitment to
make it sustainable over time, is the fruit of the will of a socialist
state that places human beings at the centre of our policies, with a
free, universal health care system and the coordinated and dedicated
intelligence of professionals and workers in the arenas of health,
science, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals.
After more than four months actively confronting
the pandemic, Cuba regrets the loss of 87 lives, but we are consoled
and encouraged by the fact that not a single child, no pregnant woman,
doctor or health worker has died.
Unquestionable successes were achieved thanks to
the coordinated action of our public health system and the country's
network of scientific institutions, incorporating the accumulated
experience of 60 years of revolutionary science and medicine in
measures adopted by the government.
For the post-COVID-19 stage, a strategy was
approved that should allow us to return gradually, step by step, in a
differentiated fashion, to a new normality in our productive and social
activities.
The Party Political Bureau, in a meeting led by
its first secretary, Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, approved
an economic strategy to address the negative effects of the pandemic,
recover and reach adequate levels of development and well-being for our
entire people, without leaving any citizen abandoned to fate.
As I expressed recently, those results seem to
have made our adversaries very uncomfortable. The aggressiveness of the
United States government against the island is growing, as are its
plans for political and ideological subversion with actions meant to
discredit Cuban leaders and the work of our government, along with
constant attempts to provoke a social explosion and opposition within
our institutions.
We are facing very well designed and heavily
financed plans to act with unprecedented ferocity and impunity on
multiple platforms within the complex contemporary media scene. We are
not surprised. The strategies of manipulation, distortion of reality
and deceit that are used daily to confuse and demobilize social
movements and the peoples of our region are no different.
But we are a people raised by Fidel, who
eliminated the word surrender from our political dictionary, very early
on.
We know and face the openly aggressive enemy,
without losing focus on our political and social priorities, without
moving even one millimeter away from the vocation of solidarity,
cultivated by Fidel and the Revolution, with the help of other sister
peoples who, as Che said, clamor for the concurrence of our modest
efforts.
A total of 45 Henry Reeve brigades specialized in
disasters and major epidemics are now working in 38 countries and
territories, with 3,772 members -- including 2,399 women -- who have
assisted more than 250,000 COVID-19 patients and saved more than 8,000
lives. In addition, 28,000 health collaborators in 58 countries have
joined national and local efforts to combat the disease, caring for
more than 83,268 COVID-19 patients and saving 13,636 lives, to date.
The altruism of our health professionals irritates
the empire which, instead of attending to the serious situation of its
own infected citizens, has unleashed a campaign to discredit Cuban
medical collaboration.
This useless war will not destroy or bury in
oblivion the human work to protect life carried out by our
professionals, earning the admiration, recognition and gratitude of
millions around the world, which has led to a movement across the
planet advocating the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to the Henry
Reeve contingent.
Worthy of note, in this battle, is the fraternal
collaboration of the Bolivarian Revolution of Venezuela, the Sandinista
Revolution in Nicaragua and the Cuban Revolution, three revolutions
with governments fully dedicated to saving lives and providing
well-being to their respective peoples; three revolutions that, facing
the brutal onslaught of the empire and its allies in the neo-liberal
right on the continent, have, with integration and firmness, defended
themselves and preserved, under very difficult conditions, the
independence, sovereignty and dignity of the homeland of Bolivar and
Chávez, of Sandino and Carlos Fonseca, of Martí
and Fidel.
This experience confirms that only cooperation and
international solidarity will save humanity from this crisis,
unprecedented in world history.
The preamble of the "Consensus of Our America," a
document that emerged from the São Paulo Forum's experience
in struggle, is dedicated to the leader of the Cuban Revolution and
states: "Among the innumerable examples Fidel bequeathed to Latin
America and the Caribbean revolutionaries, two stand out as decisive in
the struggles of our peoples, our parties and movements. These are
unity and consistent internationalism."
Faithful to his legacy, and given the challenging
reality that we are facing, the Cuban people continue the construction
of a prosperous and sustainable socialism, with the premise of what
Army General Raúl Castro Ruz has stated: "Fidel's enduring
teaching is that it is possible, that human beings are capable of
overcoming the most difficult conditions, if they do not lose their
will to triumph, correctly evaluate every situation, and do not
renounce their just, noble principles."
Dear brothers and sisters:
Cuba will continue on the independent and
sovereign path, with the people leading the way. There will be no
pandemic, no blockade, no imperial pressure that will change our course.
To political forces in the São Paulo
Forum, we call on you to mobilize in unity to face the new challenges,
along with social and popular movements and intellectuals of the left.
The true, definitive independence of Our America
depends on the character, strength and correctness for our current
struggles.
We will continue, alongside the São
Paulo Forum, to contribute to the unity and integration of Latin
America and the Caribbean.
History is made by the people, even if it is
written by others. No empire can decree the end of history as long as
there are chains to be broken, walls to be demolished, exclusions and
abuses to be fought.
For the life and independence of our peoples; for
the legacy of our founders, who taught us that even in the most
difficult conditions it was always possible, it is always possible and
will always be possible; for the new generations giving continuity to
the struggle, as Maduro explained; for anti-imperialist unity that is
the tactic and strategy of victory: We will struggle, we will live and
triumph!
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