Archive | Reflections of Fidel

  • Once Again, the Rotten OAS

    Yesterday the German cable service DPA revealed that the ICHR of the OAS approved a report pointing out that Cuba “continued to transgress” on fundamental rights by keeping “restrictions” on the population’s political and civil rights, while at the same time continuing to be the “only” country in the region where there is absolutely no freedom of expression.

  • The Only American Ex-President I Have Met

    Carter is the only ex-president of the United States that I have had the honor of meeting, other than Nixon who was not one yet.

  • A Question With No Answer

    Our world is not only threatened by the cyclical economic crises which are ever more serious and frequent. Unemployment, bankruptcy, and the huge losses in goods and wealth are inseparable companions of the blind market laws which govern the world economy today. Neo-liberalism proscribes any interference by the State, considering it a disturbing element for the economy, as if the domestic order, the army, health, education, culture, science, the courts, the judges, and many other activities could exist without the State and its laws.

  • Giving Everything

    On May Day, still under the impression of the parade, the colors of our flag, today a symbol in the eyes of the world, and the youthful, intelligent and enthusiastic faces of our students, who closed the parade of that overflowing river, the words of the poet, repeated so many times that day, came to my mind:

  • Cuba: A Terrorist Country?

    Thursday, April 30 was unlucky for the United States. On that day it occurred to them to include Cuba yet again on the list of terrorist countries. Committed as they are to their own crimes and lies, perhaps even Obama himself was unable to untangle himself from that mess. A man whose talent nobody denies must feel ashamed about the empire’s cult of lie. Fifty years of terrorism against our Homeland come to light in an instant.

  • We Will Have To Give Our All

    Yesterday, I had a lengthy talk with Miguel d’Escoto, president pro tempore of the United Nations General Assembly. I had listened to his remarks at the ALBA meeting in Cumana on April 17.

  • The Day for the Poor of the World

    Tomorrow is International Workers’ Day.

    Karl Marx called to unity: “Workers of the world unite”, although many of the poor were not workers. Lenin, who was even more far-reaching, made a call to the peasants and the colonized peoples for them to struggle together under the leadership of the proletariat.

  • An Impressive Gesture

    I confess that many times I have meditated on the dramatic story of John F. Kennedy. It was my fate to live through the era when he was the greatest and most dangerous adversary of the Revolution. It was something that didn’t play a part in his calculations. He saw himself as the representative of a new generation of Americans who were confronting the old-style, dirty politics of men of the sort of Nixon whom he had defeated with a tremendous display of political talent.

  • Pontius Pilate Washed his Hands

    Pressure against the U.S. blockade of Cuba was so great that on the day Raúl categorically declared that our country would not join the OAS, the secretary of the discredited institution began to prepare the terrain for Cuba’s participation in an eventual future Summit of the Americas. His recipe is to abolish the resolution which decided the expulsion of the Island for ideological reasons. Such an argument is truly laughable when important countries such as China and Vietnam, which the world today cannot do without, are being lead by Communist parties that were created on the same ideological foundations.

  • Trapped by History

    Daniel’s appearance on the National Television Round Table program went as I hoped. He spoke eloquently and he was persuasive, calm and irrefutable.

  • The Summit and the Lie

    Some of the things Daniel [Ortega, President of Nicaragua] told me would be difficult to believe if they weren’t being told by him and if they weren’t happening at a Summit of the Americas.

  • Obama and the Blockade

    Yesterday I referred to what was funny about the “Declaration of Commitment of Port of Spain”.

  • Feverish Dreams

    I could find no explanation for the euphoria expressed by some of the participants at the Port of Spain Summit.

  • The Secret Summit

    While neither represented at nor excommunicated from the Port of Spain Summit we were able to find out what has been discussed there up until today. We were led to fully expect that the meeting would not be private, but the stage managers deprived us of that highly interesting intellectual exercise. We would be informed of the essence, but not the tone of voice, nor the eyes, nor the faces which so much reflect people’s ideas, ethics and characters. A Secret Summit is worse than the silent movies. To Obama’s left was a man whom I could not identify very well when he placed his hand on Obama’s shoulder, like an eight-year-old school student to a compañero in the first row. Beside him, standing, another member of the retinue who interrupted him to talk with the president of the United States; I could see in those persons importuning him the stamp of an oligarchy that has never experienced hunger and which, in the powerful nation of Obama, expect to have the shield to protect the system from the feared social changes.

  • Soldiers with Correct Opinions

    It is not known how many people in the United States write to Obama and how many different topics are presented to him. It’s clear that he cannot read all the letters and deal with everything because he wouldn’t be able to fit it into a 24-hour day or a 365-day year. What is certain is that his advisors, backed up by their computers, electronic equipment and cell, answer all the letters. Their contents are recorded and there are pre-written answers supported by the multiple declarations of the new president during his campaign to be nominated and elected.

  • No rest for the world

    Anyone would think that after the Summit of the Americas, just 13 days after the G-20 meeting and on the heels of the exhausting tour of France, Germany, Prague and Turkey by President Obama, the world would have the right to rest for a few days.

  • Does the OAS have any right to exist?

    Today I spoke frankly about the atrocities committed against the peoples of Latin America. The peoples of the Caribbean were not even independent when the Cuban Revolution triumphed. Exactly on April 19th, the day when the Summit of the America finishes, it will be 48 years since the Cuban victory at Bay of Pigs. I was cautious when referring to the OAS; I didn’t say a single word that might be interpreted as an offence to that very old institution even though everyone knows how repugnant it is to us.

  • Days that Cannot be Forgotten

    Forty eight years ago mercenary troops in the service of a foreign power invaded their own homeland, escorted by a United States squadron, including an aircraft carrier and dozens of fighter planes. That date cannot be forgotten. The great power to the North can apply the same recipe to any Latin American country. It has already happened many times throughout our hemisphere’s history. Is there any declaration guaranteeing that such an action will never repeat again, either directly or through the very armies of other countries, as it occurred in the Dominican Republic, Panama, Guatemala, Chile, Argentina, Venezuela and others?

  • Not a Word About the Blockade

    The U.S. administration announced through CNN that Obama would be visiting Mexico this week, in the first part of a trip that will take him to Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, where he will be within four days taking part in the Summit of the Americas. He has announced the relief of some hateful restrictions imposed by Bush on Cubans living in the United States regarding their visits to relatives in Cuba. When questions were raised on whether such prerogatives extended to other American citizens the response was that the latter were not authorized.

  • Evo’s inevitable victory

    Evo entered today his fourth day of rigorous hunger strike. He spoke yesterday evening and today at noon. His words were calm, persuasive and categorical. He offered a “biometric electoral register” that was still better than the one in force during the electoral processes held in his country, which had already been described by international institutions as reliable and of high quality.