N E W S

• 2009: Deceptions, crises and hopes
December.30.09
THE year 2009 has ended and the international panorama offers a curious gamut of conflicts, crossroads, frustrations and extreme situations intermixed with positive hopes and developments, all combined with the serious global economic crisis provoked by the United States. Its devastating effects extended vertiginously to the rest of the world, starting with the capitalist developed countries, but had its worst effect on the nations of the Third World.

• In these five years of existence the successes of our organization are unquestionable
December.15.09
Speech given by General of the Army Raúl Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers of the Republic of Cuba, at the closing session of the 8th Summit of the ALBA-TCP at the International Conference Center, December 14, 2009

• Venezuela and Cuba have a duty to resist
December.15.09
"VENEZUELA and Cuba have a duty to resist; that is a commitment to our history, to Bolívar and Martí, to the peoples of our America," affirmed General of the Army Raúl Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers, who headed, with Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, the closing session of the 10th Inter-Governmental Commission between the two countries.

• The only solution to the case of the Five is their release
December.15.09
ON leaving the courthouse in Miami, William Norris stated that “although it is not what we wanted, we are to an extent satisfied,” given the reduction in the sentence handed down to Ramón Labañino Salazar, one of the five Cuban anti-terrorists unjustly incarcerated in the United States for more than 11 years.

• The U.S. administration was forced to recognize that we did not endanger national security
December.9.09
MIAMI.— The re-sentencing proceedings for three of the five Cuban anti-terrorists concluded yesterday after a hearing in the Federal Court of this southern Florida city. Ramón Labañino Salazar was handed down a new prison term of 30 years and Fernando González Llort was sentenced to 17 years plus nine months.
- They shouldn’t have been deprived of their freedom even for one second
- Statement by Antonio, Ramón, and Fernando: We will continue until the final victory
- MIAMI 5 

• Cuba defends key points on climate change
November.26.09
UNITED NATIONS (PL).— Prior to the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen, Cuba has reiterated to the United Nations the need to adjust current standards of production and consumption and move towards a truly sustainable economic model.

• World oil demand to increase in 2010
November.25.09
LONDON/NEW YORK.— Growing world oil use will most likely outpace the rate of new supplies in 2010, eroding the huge stockpiles of crude which have mounted around the world since the beginning of the global economic crisis, a Reuters news brief signals.

• Will Montaner and Posada confess their complicity?
November.16.09
THE U.S. State Department, the CIA, and the Spanish intelligence services (the old CESID), all knew that the Jesuit priest, Ignacio Ellacuría, rector of the Central American University (UCA), and five of his colleagues were going to be killed by a death squad from the Salvadoran Army.

• Obama can and should free the Five, states Alarcón in Venezuela
November.11.09
CARACAS, November 10.— Ricardo Alarcón, president of the National Assembly of People’s Power, today called on the United States for a signal of change toward Latin America by releasing the five anti-terrorist prisoners and arresting two notorious terrorists.

• 31 countries suffering from severe insecurity food insecurity
November.11.09
MADRID, November 10.— Food prices in poor countries that are net importers are still very high, despite a strong 2009 cereal harvest worldwide, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) alerted on Tuesday. It affirms that critical food insecurity is affecting 31 countries, which require emergency aid.

• Carmen Nordelo Tejera dies
November.3.09
Around midday on Monday November 2 in this capital, Carmen Nordelo Tejera – mother of Hero of the Republic of Cuba, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo - died aged 76 years following a long illness.

• Who the hell would vote for the blockade? Even Hillary Clinton’s spokesman is wondering
October.30.09
WHICH are the only two countries that voted on the side of the United States at the UN on the blockade against Cuba? In a press conference after the condemnation of that U.S. aggression against the island for the 18th year running, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly..

• Since the election of President Obama, there has been no change whatsoever in the implementation of the blockade
October.29.09
SPEECH BY FOREIGN MINISTER BRUNO RODRÍGUEZ PARRILLA AT THE UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY UNDER THE ITEM "NECESSITY OF ENDING THE ECONOMIC, COMMERCIAL AND FINANCIAL EMBARGO IMPOSED BY THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AGAINST CUBA".
(NEW YORK, OCTOBER 28, 2009)
- Foreign Affairs Minister Rodríguez Parrilla’s reply to the speech given by the U.S. representative

• UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY
Overwhelming majority of countries condemn blockade of Cuba
October.28.09
The United Nations General Assembly today passed the resolution condemning the economic, commercial and financial blockade of Cuba by the U.S. government, receiving 187 votes in favor - two nations more than last year – three against and two abstentions.

• Letter from Fidel to Evo: "It gives me great pleasure to congratulate you on your 50th birthday"
October.27.09
Dear Evo,
The Cuban Revolution triumphed on January 1, 1959. On October 26 of that same year, you were born. Since then, we have spent half a century withstanding the aggressions of the most powerful imperialist force in history.

• Renewed international condemnation on Wednesday of U.S. blockade against Cuba
October.26.09
THE United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday will vote on a resolution condemning the U.S. blockade against Cuba, after around 30 presidents and other international leaders criticized the blockade in that same forum.

• Cuba denounces difficulty in making payments to organizations in Switzerland due to the blockade
October.21.09
GENEVA, October 20. — Rodolfo Reyes, the Cuban ambassador in Geneva, denounced at a press conference here today the difficulties that his country faces in complying with its contributions to international agencies in Switzerland due to the U.S. economic, commercial, and financial blockade, PL reported.

• Cuban doctors in Bolivia: symbols of the ALBA
October.16.09
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia, October 15.— Casilda Ramos, a young Bolivian woman who traveled from Sucre to see the Cuban doctors at the Valle Hermoso Hospital in the southern region of Cochabamba, now understands the meaning of the initials: ALBA.

• Blockade policy is still intact and its regulations are being fully applied
October.13.09
THE criminal, illegal and immoral essence of the blockade imposed by the United States was once again exposed during a public hearing convened by the International Relations Commission of the National Assembly of People’s Power.

• The cruelest face of the blockade
October.6.09
THE blockade of Cuba, maintained for more than 50 years by successive U.S. administrations with the intention of undermining the population through hunger and disease has led to repercussions in the public healthcare sector amounting to $25 million from May 2008 to April 2009 alone.

• CHINA
A giant on the march
October.1.09
TALKING of China in the past or present requires superlative terms. Its territorial and human extension, the volume of its natural resources, the complexity of its extremely ancient history and the hard-won advances of the last 60 years, could figure within the record category without any need to exaggerate.

• United States prevents purchase of devices for removing pacemaker electrodes
October.1.09
THE head of the Department of Arrhythmias and Pacemakers at the Institute of Cardiology and Cardiovascular Surgery, Dr. Francisco Dorticós Balea, has condemned in Havana the systematic refusal of the U.S. transnational corporation Cook Vascular Inc. to sell Cuba certain devices used for extracting damaged electrodes or cables implanted in the cardiac cavity for the function of pacemakers.

• The discourse and the reality do not agree
September.29.09
Speech given by Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, minister of foreign affairs of the Republic of Cuba, during the debate in the 64^th Session of the UN General Assembly
- International community demands end of the blockade of Cuba

• Olga Tañón: Cuba is more alive than ever
September.19.09
HAVANA (PL).—Puerto Rican singer Olga Tañón has invited a group of students from the Amadeo Roldán Music Conservatoire to join her on stage this Sunday to open the Peace without Borders concert, so as to show the world that Cuba is more alive than ever.

• Final details for Peace without Borders concert in the Plaza
September.19.09
PREPARATIONS for the Peace without Borders concert are moving ahead as planned and the necessary equipment is being installed in the Plaza de la Revolución, according to Norma Fernández, director of the Artistic Productions Agency.

• New president of General Assembly reiterates condemnation of blockade of Cuba
September.19.09
UNITED NATIONS.—Ali Abdussalem Treki, the new president of the UN General Assembly, has reiterated his condemnation of the U.S. blockade of Cuba, while highlighting the widespread and constant international rejection of that policy of harassment.

• Obama maintains blockade policy against Cuba
September.16.09
PRESIDENT Barack Obama has signed an order extending for one year the law applied to impose the U.S. trade blockade of Cuba, despite calls to let it expire, Reuters reports from Washington, stating that the president has followed in the footsteps of his predecessors dating back to the 1970s.

•  Vigil for the Five at the Flag Memorial
September.11.09
A patriotic and revolutionary vigil is taking place tonight on the eve of September 12, the date when the five Cuban antiterrorist fighters complete their eleventh year of incarceration in the United States.

• Remembering Neto
September.10.09
ON September 10, 1979, 30 years ago, the noble heart of Antonio Agostinho Neto ceased beating. We received the news from a tearful Kundy Paihama, who was leading the Angolan delegation to the 6th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement, which had concluded in Havana the previous day.

•  Lawsuit related to the Five heroes filed
September.10.09
WASHINGTON, September 9. – The Partnership for Civil Justice Fund has filed a lawsuit in the United States related to the case of the five Cuban antiterrorist imprisoned in this country since 1998. The group is acting on behalf of the National Committee to Free the Cuban Five and officially brought the lawsuit before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, according to PL.

• The Untold Story of the Cuban Five (Part III)
The Face of Impunity
September.9.09
As they recognized during voir dire, the kidnapping of Elian González and its consequences for the community was very much in the minds of those chosen to be jurors at the trial of the Cuban Five a few months after the six-year-old boy was rescued by the federals.

• The Untold Story of the Cuban Five (Part 1)
Forbidden Heroes
September.8.09
REMEMBER Elian?
The case of Elian González, a six year-old boy forcefully retained by his unknown great-uncles against the will of his father and in clear defiance of U.S. law and decency was widely reported by media around the world. Miami, the place of the kidnapping, became a kind of secessionist city in North America when the Mayor, the chief of police, the politicians, every newspaper and local radio and TV broadcasters, together with religious and business institutions, joined with some of the most notorious terrorist and violent groups in opposing the courts' and government's orders to free the boy.
- Justice in Wonderland

• Cuba and China strengthen cooperation in biotechnology
September.8.09
BEIJING, September 7.—Cuba and China have renewed for a further five years an existing memorandum of intent for biotechnological cooperation that between the two countries, in a confirmation of its positive development, PL reports.

• The case of the Five is a legal aberration
September.2.09
THE case of the Five is a “legal aberration,” affirmed Miguel d'Escoto, president of the 63rd Session of UN General Assembly, during a meeting with family members of the anti-terrorist Cubans, who have been political prisoners in U.S. jails for the last 11 years.  D'Escoto...

• Three of the Cuban Five await resentencing in Miami
September.1.09
RAMÓN Labañino, Antonio Guerrero and Fernando González are now being held in Miami’s Federal Detention Center to attend a resentencing hearing scheduled for October 13, the CubaDebate website reports. Before Joan Lenard, the same judge who condemned the five Cuban antiterrorists to long and unjust sentences in 2001...

• Blockade is just the same: million-dollar fine for ANZ bank
August.27.09
A fine of $5.75 million has been paid by the Australia and New Zealand Bank (ANZ), a powerful financial group, for engaging in transactions that allegedly benefited Cuba and Sudan via U.S. bank accounts, according to a report by the Treasury Department published today in El Nuevo Herald.

• In terms of Afghanistan
Could become Obama’s Vietnam, confirms The New York Times
August.25.09
PRESIDENT Obama had not even taken office before supporters were etching his likeness onto Mount Rushmore as another Abraham Lincoln or the second coming of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Yet what if they got the wrong predecessor? What if Mr. Obama is fated to be another Lyndon B. Johnson instead?
 
• The legal side of the battle
August.21.09
A “No,” without any explanation whatsoever, was the response of the U.S. Supreme Court last June 15 to the petition to review the case of Gerardo, Ramón, Antonio, Fernando and René. Yet another insult on the part of Made in USA-justice. Despite the worldwide clamor in favor of the five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters, that country’s highest judicial body turned a “deaf ear” and, loyal to political interests...

• Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez leading Cuban delegation to ALBA’s Social Ministerial Council
August.21.09
MIGUEL Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and minister of higher education, arrived yesterday in Bolivia at the head of an official Cuban delegation to the 1st Meeting of the Council of Social Ministers of the ALBA-TCP...

• Accused of mega-fraud in Spain, conman Valladares heads for…Honduras
August.18.09
ARMANDO Valladares, the bizarre Cuban-American “dissident” whom Reagan appointed ambassador to the UN and who was recently involved – in his role as general secretary of the Human Rights Foundation – in an assassination attempt in Bolivia, has recently left this bogus NGO under the pretext of “devoting himself” to the Honduran “cause”.

• We will never cease being the proud heirs of your work
August.13.09
Happiness can only be found in struggle
Dear Fidel,
I wish you all the happiness in the world today, as you deserve, and accompanying my wish is a revolutionary embrace. As the son of a people that, a long time ago, incorporated you ideas into their heritage, those ideas in which we have been educated and which are invisible, I add myself to the festivities for your birthday.

• Rail to attend President Correa’s inauguration today
August.10.09
QUITO. – Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz arrived in this city on Sunday morning to attend the inauguration ceremony for President Rafael Correa Delgado, reelected at the beginning of last April. The official inauguration ceremony is scheduled for Monday morning at the National Assembly...

• Radio and TV Martí: Roig lets the guillotine fall
August.7.09
HEADS are rolling at Radio and TV Martí. Director Pedro Roig, who always kept jobs available for his clan, has let the guillotine fall, sending 35 employees packing from that corporation, which is dedicated to manufacturing lies against Cuba that do not even go anywhere.

• Cuba: USAID making ever-higher investments in subversion
August.5.09
THE U.S. offensive against progressive Latin America is now being intensified in terms of the countries of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA).

• Raúl’s tour: emotional in Namibia, intense in Angola
July.24.09
RAUL’S arrival in Namibia on Sunday July 19 was the apotheosis of the close, combative fraternity that remains unscathed despite the years gone by. How truly the inspiration of the Moncada Assault spoke when he said, "Soul and opportunity is what the peoples need to redeem themselves, and when there is an opportunity, out come their souls."

• Raúl concludes working visit to Angola
July.23.09
LUANDA, July 22.— An embrace between Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz and Angolan President José Eduardo Dos Santos a few hours before Raúl left this sister nation, was the final note in the farewell ceremony for the Cuban delegation that has been making a working visit to the country.

• Fruitful meeting between Raúl and Dos Santos
July.22.09
LUANDA, July 21.— The meeting between Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz and Angolan President José Eduardo Dos Santos allowed for a broad and fruitful exchange of ideas, as corresponds to the fraternity existing between the two nations.

• Raúl arrives in Angola for a working visit
July.21.09
LUANDA, July 20.—President Raúl Castro Ruz arrived in this capital city this afternoon for a working visit. He was received at the Quatro de Fevereiro International Airport by Prime Minister Paulo Kassoma, the Luanda Governor Espiritu Santo, and other officials.
- Joint communiqué on the occasion of the official visit to the Republic of Namibia by General of the Army Raúl Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers of the Republic of Cuba

• Raúl in Namibia
July.20.09
WINDHOEK, July 19.—An embrace on the tarmac of Windhoek International Airport between President Raúl Castro Ruz and President Hifikepunye Lucas Pohamba of Namibia initiated the Cuban leader’s official visit to that African sister nation on Sunday afternoon.

• Raúl meets with presidents of Vietnam and Sri Lanka
July.17.09
CAIRO, July 16.— Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz arrived in this city late on Thursday where he will continue his visit to Egypt after attending the 15th Non-Aligned Movement Summit.

• "Consolidating the unity emanating from the diversity that characterizes us"
July.16.09
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt, July 15.—"We are convinced that this 15th Summit will further strengthen the Non-Aligned Movement and Cuba will fully support Egypt’s work at the head of it," affirmed Raúl during his speech in which he summarized the activities undertaken during Cuba’s presidency of the Movement, from 2006-2009.

• The Five
Unsurpassable cruelty
July.16.09
WITH unsurpassable cruelty, the U.S. State Department today (July 15) once again denied a visa to Adriana Pérez, thus preventing her from visiting her husband, Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, who is unjustly incarcerated in the United States for having fought, peacefully and without weapons, against anti-Cuban terrorist groups who have always had the sponsorship and protection of successive U.S. governments, including the current administration.

• We are calling for the urgent construction of a new international financial architecture
July.15.09
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt. — Cuban President Raúl Castro affirmed here today that unity and solidarity among the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement are indispensable requirements for increasing the impact of our positions.

• Press release from the Cuban delegation to migration talks with the United States, New York, July 14, 2009
July.15.09
ON July 14, 2009, six years after they were suspended by the Bush administration, rounds of migration talks between Cuba and the United States were renewed. The Cuban delegation was led by Dagoberto Rodríguez, deputy foreign minister, and the U.S.

• Raúl’s meetings in Algeria
July.15.09
“WE two presidents have been working hard, with full agreement on the issues concerned,” affirmed Raúl after two private bilateral meetings with his close friend Abdelaziz Bouteflika, president of Algeria, over approximately eight hours between Sunday, July 12 and the following Monday.

• Raúl arrives in Egypt
July.15.09
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt, July 14.— Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz arrived in Sharm el Sheikh – the venue of the 15th Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit – in the afternoon of Tuesday, July 14.

• Extensive exchange between Raúl and Bouteflika
July.14.09
ALGIERS, July 13.— "As you have seen, we two presidents have worked hard, yesterday and today, and we are in full agreement on all international issues discussed," Raúl told reporters after a working session that lasted more than five hours.

• Egypt acknowledges Cuba’s role during its presidency of the NAM
July.14.09
SARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt, July 13.—Egypt expressed here today its gratitude to and recognition of Cuba for its excellent efforts during the island’s presidency of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), from 2006 to date.


• Raúl arrives in Algeria
July.13.09
ALGIERS, July 12.— Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz was received with an embrace last Sunday afternoon by Abdelaziz Bouteflika, president of the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, as he stepped down from the Cubana Aviation airliner that brought him to this city to begin a working visit to this sister North African nation.

• Tens of thousands of people die each year in the United States from lack of medical attention
July.9.09
DESPITE high healthcare spending in the United States, 47 million people are without medical insurance and 108 million insured people have insufficient medical coverage. As a consequence, between 18,000 (according to the Institute of Medicine) and 100,000 (according to Himmelstein, Harvard University) die each year because of a lack of adequate medical attention.

• No negotiations, only planning the departure of the coup government, affirms Zelaya
July.8.09
WASHINGTON, JULY 7. — The constitutional president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, today accepted the mediation of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias as a means of ending the de facto regime installed in that country after the June 28 coup d’état.

• We identify with his dignified position
July.1.09
DEAR compañero Manuel Zelaya, the sole and dignified constitutional president of Honduras:
Profound indignation has shaken our cells in the face of the brutal coup d’état in your homeland, reminiscent of a past that is still fresh in the historic memory of Central America.

• United States urged to condemn coup in Honduras
June.28.09
UNITED NATIONS, June 28 (PL). — UN General Assembly president Miguel D’Escoto called today on U.S. President Barack Obama to immediately condemn the military coup carried out against Honduran President Manuel Zelaya.

• CASE OF THE CUBAN FIVE
U.S. Supreme Court decision under continuing condemnation
June.25.09
THE United States Supreme Court decision not to review the case of the Cuban Five, imprisoned in that country for close to 11 years for combating terrorism, continues to be criticized by many different groups and individuals in Cuba and the rest of the world who believe that true justice would be the immediate release of these anti-terrorist fighters.

• Thank you Fidel, thank you Cuba
June.25.09
TYLER MacNiven flew to the Bahamas from California and from there to Havana on June 7; being a U.S. citizen he was unable to fly direct to the Cuban capital and, in fact, he is not even permitted to come to us via a third country. According to U.S. legislation he is exposing himself to a sanction.

• The solid arguments have been trampled on once again
June.25.09
The Organization for Solidarity with the Peoples of Africa, Asia, and Latin America (OSPAAAL) condemns the refusal of the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case of the five Cuban heroes unjustly incarcerated in U.S. territory for almost 11 years.

• Obama can order the release of the Five, Alarcón reaffirms
June.24.09
MATANZAS (AIN).— U.S. President Barack Obama can order the release of the five Cuban anti-terrorists imprisoned in the United States, Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, reaffirmed.

• Women for the freedom of our compatriots
June.22.09
"We shall continue this battle for those who, despite the passing of the years, are keeping alive the hope of reunion; we shall fight untiringly to confront this crime against tenderness and love, a crime against this most human of rights: happiness," affirmed jurist Ivonne Pérez at the Cuban women’s ‘Open Tribunal’ organized yesterday to protest the refusal of the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case of the five Cuban heroes.
- Appeal from UPEC: To all honorable journalists everywhere
- Another supreme infamy

• Work of a cuban artist pirated in Canada
June.22.09
The Yves-Laroche gallery placed in Montreal It was commercializing a work of the internationally well-known cuban artist Arístides Hernández Guerrero (ARES) violating his author rights and signed by another person "ARIEL?".

• Posada Carriles’ participation in assassination plot revealed
June.22.09
CARACAS, June 21.— Former Venezuelan vice president José Vicente Rangel today identified the international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles as a participant in a plot to assassinate President Hugo Chávez in El Salvador, PL reports.

• Young people protest against new injustice in the Five’s case
June.19.09
THE recent refusal by the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case of our five heroes, scorning the demand for "Freedom!" that is latent in every part of the world, and the adjournment of the trial of the criminal Luis Posada Carriles, has once again demonstrated that justice in the empire of the North is neither blind, nor does it wear spectacles.

• The immediate release of the Five is the only way to do real justice
June.18.09
THE decision of the United States Supreme Court which, in response to a petition from that country’s government, did not agree to review the case of our Five Heroes, is a resounding slap in the face for those of us who are fighting for a world that is truly respectful, just and free of the scourge of terrorism.
- MIAMI 5

• Voices against infamy
June.17.09
"WE never placed our hopes on the U.S. judicial system," but this day will be "marked forever as one of the most shameful in U.S. jurisprudence," Alicia Jrapko said told Granma newspaper via email, after learning about the June 15 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court not to review the case of the Cuban Five, the anti-terrorist fighters held as political prisoners in that country since September 12, 1998.

• Press release from the International Committee to Free the Five
June.16.09
THE U.S. Supreme Court has announced that it will not review the case of the five Cuban patriots. This decision prevents our five brothers, unjustly incarcerated for more than 10 years for monitoring terrorist organizations based in Miami, from having even the possibility of a fair and impartial trial outside of Miami.
- Cuban Parliament calls for intensifying the fight for the Five

• And when will Miami’s terrorist nest be cleared out?
June.11.09
DESPITE being denounced and calls from Venezuela for his extradition, Luis Posada Carriles, the most dangerous terrorist in the hemisphere, is still conspiring to murder with his accomplices without any intervention from the U.S. legal authorities.

• Cuba recognized in the Human Rights Council
June.11.09
ON Wednesday June 10, the UN Human Rights Council adopted the Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), presented on February 5 and 9 of 2009. On that occasion, the Cuban delegation was headed by Justice Minister María Esther Reus and current Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez.

• Petrocaribe: cooperation in times of crisis
June.11.09
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts and Nevis, June 10.— The 6th Petrocaribe Summit which begins here on June 11, is to see another demonstration of viability in crisis situations, via a focus that promotes a defined energy agreement as solidarity-based cooperation.

• Obama could and should withdraw the false charges against the Five
June.5.09
“OBAMA could and should withdraw the false charges on which our five compañeros were framed,” affirmed Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada, president of the National Assembly of People’s Power, during the launch of a six-volume publication – translated into Spanish – of the 12 Amicus Brief documents asking the U.S.

• Fidel and the Cuban people have been absolved by history
June.4.09
SAN PEDRO SULA, Honduras, June 3.—Manuel Zelaya, president of Honduras, the host nation for the 39th OAS General Assembly, today affirmed that Fidel Castro, the maximum leader of the Cuban Revolution, and his people have been absolved by history and that a “wise rectification” had been made by repealing the agreement via which Cuba was suspended from the Inter-American System in 1962.

• U.S. government presents its opposition to the Supreme Court reviewing the Five’s case
May.26.09
RICARDO Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, stated today (May 25) that the U.S. government presented its brief in opposition to the Supreme Court reviewing the case of the five Cuban anti-terrorists incarcerated in that country last weekend.

• Europe facing deeper recession
May.25.09
EUROPE sank deeper into recession during the first quarter of this year and in Japan deflationary pressure caused by the world economic crisis became more pronounced, thus reducing the possibility of recovery in the United States, which had less negative figures, according to analysts.

• Oil revenue down by half in Venezuela
May.21.09
CARACAS, May 20.—Economics Minister Ali Rodríguez stated this Wednesday that the country’s oil revenue had fallen by half this year in comparison with 2008, as a result of the decrease in crude prices, AP reports.

• Recognition for Cuba in Geneva
May.21.09
GENEVA, May 20.— The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) today drew up strategies focusing on the health sector in order to confront the crisis affecting the world, during a meeting in this city which heard praise for Cuba’s role as rotating president of the group.

• The last farewell to Mario Benedetti
May.20.09
MONTEVIDEO.— Thousands of Uruguayans bade farewell to writer Mario Benedetti, not only in their own name but also in the name of the millions of people around the world who were similarly enriched by the aesthetics of his verse and the principles of his life.

• The world needs peace, social justice and health in the face of the crisis
May.20.09
GENEVA, May 19.— Cuba stated today at the World Health Assembly that the crises currently affecting the world require a system of peace based on social justice and the guarantee of access to health as a fundamental right for all.

• Casa de las Américas: note on the death of Mario Benedetti
May.19.09
THE writer Mario Benedetti has just died. It is sad news for Latin American literature. From the mid-1940’s, Benedetti has been weaving a vast and diverse body of work in which not only the poetry and narrative that have captivated millions of readers have found a place, but also essays, dramatic works, criticism and journalism.

• We’re not sitting here waiting for an avalanche of easy tourism
May.15.09
CUBA is to work on improving its methods for more effective tourism marketing and promotion, Tourism Minister Manuel Marrero announced, confirming that, "we are not sitting here waiting for an avalanche of easy tourism."

• CARLOS MUÑIZ VARELA
The crime against him remains unsolved
May.15.09
• THE desire to create dialogue and reunion between his compatriots living inside and outside of Cuba cost Carlos Muñiz Varela his life 30 years ago. And his killers remain unpunished.

• Armando Valladares’ CIA organization linked to plot against Evo Morales
May.15.09
THE Bolivian district attorney’s office has identified Hugo Achá Melgar who, according to the AFP news agency, is Bolivia’s representative to the U.S. Human Rights Foundation (HRF), as providing the bulk of the funds for the terrorist gang foiled in Santa Cruz while plotting to assassinate President Evo Morales.

• Only case of Influenza A in Cuba progressing favorably
May.14.09
THE only confirmed case in Cuba of Influenza A H1N1, a Mexican medical student, is progressing favorably, Manuel Santín, national director of Epidemiology, confirmed on the "Roundtable" television program.

• Cuba reelected member of Human Rights Council
May.12.09
UNITED NATIONS, May 12.—Cuba was today reelected for a second three-year term as a member of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), in a secret vote at the General Assembly. For Latin America and the Caribbean, those elected were Cuba, Mexico and Uruguay, all of them second-time candidates for a seat on this important UN agency based in Geneva.

• 1,600,000 people have benefited from Mission Miracle
May.12.09
HAVANA, May 12.— From July 2004 to date, Mission Miracle, an idea of the leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, has benefited more than 1,600,000 people in 33 countries, including Cuba.

• MANUEL ROSALES AND JUSTICE
He who owes it, fears it
May.8.09
THE pro-coup Venezuelan opposition is preoccupied. Its central media image and "strongman," the "democratic leader" Manuel Rosales, is wanted by Interpol and the Venezuelan justice system for nothing less than charges of corruption and the illegal acquisition of wealth during his term as governor of the state of Zulia and his more recent mandate as mayor of the populous, wealthy city of Maracaibo.

• ARGENTINA
Bosses’ rebellion and early elections
May.8.09
IN recent months, Argentina’s large capitalist enterprises, possibly in alliance with transnational corporations, have unleashed a sort of employers’ crusade that has damaged the country in the midst of a global economic crisis.

• United States prevents Silvio from attending Pete Seeger's 90th birthday
May.4.09
THE U.S. State Department, currently under the leadership of Hilary Clinton, has prevented the famous Cuban singer/songwriter Silvio Rodríguez from attending celebrations in New York for the legendary American folk singer Pete Seeger’s 90th birthday.

• The crisis cannot be solved behind the back of the UN
April 29.09
"THE greatest strength of our movement (Non-Aligned Movement) lies in its unity within the diversity that characterizes us. That has been the fundamental premise of the exercise of the Cuban presidency during these close to three years of mandate," emphasized President Raúl Castro, in his speech during the opening session of the NAM coordination bureau.

• The NAM can always count on Cuba’s contribution
April 28.09
THE Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) can always count on Cuba’s contribution to the fight to achieve its noble objectives, stated Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, on opening the senior officials’ segment of the Ministerial Meeting of the NAM Coordination Bureau, which is in session until this Thursday in Havana’s International Conference Center.

• Cuba adopts preventive measures against swine flu
April 21.09
THE Cuban Ministry of Public Health has announced in a note addressed to the population preventive measures that are being taken to prevent the A (H1N1) swine influenza (flu) virus from entering the country. The virus is epidemic in Mexico and cases have been reported in the United States and Canada.

• Cuba defends relevance of General Assembly in UN reform
April 21.09
UNITED NATIONS, April 20. –Cuba rejected today attempts to link UN reforms with granting more powers to the Security Council to the detriment of the General Assembly. "The Security Council’s agenda is steadily increasing and is usurping tasks that are the responsibility of the General Assembly and other UN agencies," affirmed Rodolfo Benítez Verson, counselor to the Cuban mission.

• Cuba reaffirms vocation of solidarity with the people of the Americas
April 17.09
Speech by President Raúl Castro Ruz, in the public segment of the 5th Extraordinary ALBA Summit, Cumaná, Venezuela, April 16, 2009

• Cuba’s moral authority highlighted at civil forum in Port of Spain
April 16.09
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago, April 15. — Luis Andrade, secretary general of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), affirmed today that the United States has been marginalized in its policy toward Cuba, a country that has responded to its isolation with its greatest strength: moral authority

• UN to hold conference on global economic crisis
April 10.09
UNITED NATIONS. – The General Assembly of the UN has approved a conference at the highest level directed at seeking solutions to the current global economic and financial crisis.

• Cuba supports urgent reform of Security Council methods
April 9.09
UNITED NATIONS, April 8.—Cuba today presented its proposals concerning the membership and working methods of the Security Council, during a session devoted to debating the issue within the General Assembly.

• Posada accused in relation to the attacks in Havana
April 9.09
IN a surprising change of strategy, Washington district attorneys responsible for the case against Luis Posada Carriles have increased the number of charges brought against the international terrorist in El Paso, Texas, with respect to false statements in relation to the campaign of attacks that he unleashed in Havana in 1997.

• Posada Carriles will be tried again
April 8.09
The trial of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, charged with migratory fraud and false testimony, has been set for August 10 before the same judge that previously freed him; and the attorney generals, who continue to ignore his terrorist past, have requested that they set his bail for $350,000 as a guarantee that he will appear in court.

• Prominent New Zealanders demand release of the Five
April 7.09
WELLINGTON, April 6.— One hundred prominent political, parliamentary and trade union figures in New Zealand today called on the U.S. government to immediately release the five Cuban anti-terrorists who have been serving unjust sentences in that country for more than 10 years.

• Anti-NATO protests
April 3.09
BADEN-BADEN, Germany, April 2. – Tens of thousands of protestors congregated in two towns in southeastern Germany and in Strasbourg, eastern France, to protest against the NATO summit on the 60th anniversary of that alliance.

• Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega to arrive in Cuba today
April 2.09
THE President of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega Saavedra, is due to arrive in Cuba today for a working visit. He was invited to the island by Cuban President Raúl Castro Ruz.

• Growing discrepancies mark prelude to G20 Summit
April 2.09
LONDON, April 1.—Heavy storm clouds advanced today over the G-20 Summit, weighed down by growing discrepancies between a significant number of European countries and the United States, as well as mass protests that have marked the streets of London since last Wednesday.

• 2nd Summit of Arab-South American Countries
Demands new international financial system
April 1.09
DOHA, March 31.— The 2nd Summit of Arab-South American Countries (ASAC) ended with demands for substantial changes in the world arena, and revalidating the traditional positions of Third World integration mechanisms.

• UN predicts growth of slums due to crisis
March 31.09
NAIROBI, March 30.— The global economic crisis is threatening efforts to help the growing number of people living in slum conditions, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said on Monday.

• Ten million malnourished children as a result of increased food prices
March 30.09
LONDON, March 29.— More than 10 million children are starving because of the global economic crisis which has led to an increase in food prices and could provoke the death of up to 400,000 of them by the end of the year, stated a report by the British organization Save the Children, and cited by ANSA.

• The blockade is still in place
Amendments on Cuba passed in the USA
March 23.09
THE president of the United States, Barack Obama, has passed a $410 billion federal budget law which includes 8% more spending than it did for the last fiscal year and changes to U.S. policies on Cuba.

• FAO director requests urgent action to fight hunger
March 10.09
BRASILIA, March 9.—Jacques Diouf, director general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, speaking in Brasilia yesterday, reiterated his call for rapid action by governments to fight global hunger and increasing danger in this context as a result of the world financial and economic crisis.

• Amicus brief lodged in Supreme Court shows strong support for the Five
March 6.09
TODAY, March 6, 2009, a total of 12 documents from friends of the Court (amicus curiae brief) were lodged at the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the petition presented by the defense team of the Five on January 30 asking the Court to re-examine the case.

• 51 million jobs could disappear worldwide
February 25.09
The International Labour Organization (ILO) said that approximately 51 million jobs around the world could disappear by the end of the year.

• FROM THE FOREIGN PRESS
Prisoners tortured to death
February 24.09
The American Civil Liberties Union has released previously classified excerpts of a government report on harsh interrogation techniques used in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay. These previously unreported pages detail repeated use of "abusive" behavior, even to the point of prisoner deaths.
- Now, contradictorily, the Pentagon says there is no torture on the illegal Guantánamo base

• Ecuador expels U.S. diplomat
February 19.09
QUITO, February 18.- The Ecuadorian government today expelled Max Sullivan, first secretary of the U.S. embassy in Quito, for interfering in the country’s internal affairs, PL reported. Ecuadorian Foreign Secretary Fander Falconí made the announcement after the Police Command presented its report at a meeting of the National Security Council (COSENA).

• The blockade is unjust and anachronistic; it needs to end
February 16.09
ÁLVARO Colom Caballeros, president of the Republic of Guatemala, condemned the economic blockade imposed by the United States on Cuba for almost 50 years, after he arrived in Havana on Sunday night in response to an invitation by President Raúl Castro.

• Raúl has warm meeting with leaders of the Russian Communist Party
February 4.09
MOSCOW, February 3.—President Raúl Castro was decorated with the 90th Anniversary of the Red Army Medal, instituted by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, by Gennady Zyuganov, its president and parliamentary leader of the Duma.

• Russian Patriarch receives Cuban President
February 4.09
MOSCOW, February 3.—The Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and all Russia received President Raúl Castro Ruz yesterday afternoon.

• Raúl begins official visit to Angola
February 4.09
CUBAN President Raúl Castro Ruz today begins an official visit to the Republic of Angola, in response to an invitation by its President José Eduardo Dos Santos. Raúl is to have official talks with his Angolan counterpart and meetings with other leaders of this sister nation.

• Raúl and Putin meeting in Moscow
February 3.09
MOSCOW, February 2.—A meeting between President Raúl Castro and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation was the first activity on the fifth day of the Cuban delegation’s visit to Moscow...

• Raúl’s visit widely reflected in the Russian press
February 2.09
MOSCOW.—The major Russian media has highlighted the visit here of President Raúl Castro Ruz, his first as head of state. “It is a great historical moment in relations between Russia and Cuba, nations that are old friends,” and “Russia and Cuba affirm one century of friendship,” were among the national headlines.

• Solidarity remains essential
January 29.09
THE need to step up international solidarity in order to take before the U.S. Supreme Court the case of the Cuban Five — imprisoned in that country for combating terrorism — was one of the main topics of discussion between relatives of these men and members of the 26th Contingent of the Southern Cross Brigade from Australia and New Zealand.

• Posada trying to take his case to the Supreme Court
January 29.09
IN a new delaying tactic to avoid his extradition to Venezuela or Panama, the emigration trial of Luis Posada Carriles is to be taken before the Supreme Court, affirms Arturo V. Hernández, the mafia lawyer of the international terrorist, according to an article on this controversial case in The New York Times.

• Millions of taxpayer dollars to protect terrorist
January 29.09
THE New Jersey grand jury that has been in session for three years, whose mandate is to examine evidence of international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles’ participation in the terror campaign unleashed in Havana in 1997, has now cost U.S. taxpayers "millions of dollars," without having reached any conclusion.

• Cuba to attend Human Rights Council with head held high
January 29.09
CUBA is to attend the Universal Periodic review (UPR) of the Human Rights Council with its head held high and a clean conscience, given its work in favor of human rights for all Cuban men and women, affirmed Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, during a press conference at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX).

• Cuban Five condemn Israeli aggression in Gaza
January 21.09
Urgent message to the Palestinian people:
IT is with profound pain and infinite indignation that we have witnessed the criminal massacre of the Palestinian people; there are no words to describe this holocaust.
- MIAMI 5

• Cuban Five Case to go to U.S. Supreme Court
December 26.08
WASHINGTON, Dec. 25 — The appeal of the Cuban Five, the anti-terrorist fighters held as political prisoners in the United States, is to be brought before the Supreme Court before January 30, according to one of their defense lawyers.

• Raúl in Brazil
December 16.08
SALVADOR DE BAHIA, December 15.—President Raúl Castro arrived in this beautiful Brazilian city on Monday afternoon to participate in the Latin American and Caribbean Summit on Integration and Development (CALCA), which takes place here on Tuesday and Wednesday.

• Raúl in Caracas
December 15.08
CARACAS. — Between Cuba and Venezuela there is an epic that transcends formalities and is founded on the morality and ideals that have determined the circumstances of a history that profoundly unites their struggles of almost two centuries to take forward a truly liberating revolution.

• Raul Castro Sent Message to CDR Congress
December 15.08
HAVANA, CUBA. — Cuban President Raul Castro, who is on an official visit to Venezuela, sent a salutation message to participants at the 7th Congress of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR), which winds up on Sunday in this city.

• New vaccine plant at the Finlay Institute
‘We want to serve more’
December 12.08
A letter addressed to the Finlay Institute from the World Health Organization in July 2006, asking for help in producing millions of doses of the anti-meningitis vaccine, was the motive for the inauguration at that renowned center of Cuban biotechnology, of a plant with a production capacity of up to 100 million doses annually of active components for that purpose.

• 30th International Festival of New Latin American Cinema
Tributes and special screenings in Havana
December 4.08
LATIN American films have a guaranteed audience in Havana, with more than 500,000 movie spectators recorded at the festival on the island last year. For this reason, many of the festival’s directors elect to be present when their films are shown in the event’s movie theatres and also why the highly valued Popularity Prize is awarded according to the results of ballots marked at the end of each film.

 • FRAUD IN USAID
Not everything they seem to be
December 4.08
 WHILE Felipe E. Sixto – Bush’s collaborator who stole half a million dollars set aside for subversive activities – is being charged in Washington, the USAID director who covered up the embezzlement and the CIA agent who protected the thief are not facing any charges at all.

• 3rd Cuba-CARICOM summit announced
December 2.08
ON Monday, December 8, the 3rd Summit of Heads of State and Government of Cuba and the 14 independent nations that comprise the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) takes place in Santiago de Cuba, "the heroic city."

• Africa calls for global awareness of climate change
November 21.08
ALGIERS, November 20 (PL).—Representatives from African countries agreed here today on the need to reinforce their institutions in order to develop a collective capacity for negotiating and drawing up projects to counteract the effects of climate change.

• 45 YEARS AFTER THE ASSAINATION OF JOHN. F. KENNEDY
The CIA Nostra
November 21.08
CIA documents declassified since 1992 under the JFK Records Act, in conjunction with other investigations, demonstrate that President John F. Kennedy was the victim of a sinister conspiracy.

• Cuba joins Rio Group
November 14.08
THE 27th Ministerial Meeting of the Permanent Mechanism for Consultation and Political Coordination (Río Group) has taken place in Zacatecas, Mexico, during which the foreign ministers agreed in a communiqué that they will consider Cuba a full member of the group from today.
- Statement from the revolutionary government

• On Fidel Castro’s book Peace in Colombia
November 12.08
DURING recent months various events in Colombia have been commented on by Fidel in his habitual "Reflections," published in the Cuban press.

• Firms fined for breaking U.S. blockade of Cuba
November 12.08
MIAMI.—Three U.S. firms have been fined more than $43,000 for breaking the U.S. blockade, according to the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), and reported by Notimex.
- U.S. blockade obstructing scientific exchange

• President Medvedev highlights links between Russia and Cuba
November 12.08
MOSCOW, November 11.—Russian President Dmitri Medvedev today highlighted the qualitative increase in relations with Cuba, on receiving Cuban Foreign Minster Felipe Pérez Roque at the Kremlin.

• Vladimir Putin receives Cuban foreign minister
November 11.08
MOSCOW, November 10.—Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin received here today Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque.

• Hurricane Paloma continues moving north
November 7.08
THE Forecast Center at the Cuban Meteorology Institute has emitted Alert No. 8 on Hurricane Paloma, detailing that at 6.00am, the center of the cyclone was estimated at 18.1 degrees latitude North and 81.7 degrees longitude West, some 140 kilometers south-southeast of Grand Cayman and some 400 kilometers west of Montego Bay, Jamaica.

• Ally of CIA and proconsul McCarry sentenced to 30 years
November 6.08
EMMANUEL "Toto" Constant, chief of a CIA-backed Haitian death squad that massacred, tortured and terrorized thousands of his compatriots, and whose accomplices later collaborated with another agent — the U.S. proconsul for Cuba, Caleb McCarry — has just been sentenced in New York to 30 years in prison.

• PANAMA
Officials who freed Posada and accomplices stand trial
November 6.08
FORMER Panamanian Justice Minister Arnulfo Escalona and former police chief Carlos Barés are to finally stand trial for abuse of authority in releasing Luis Posada Carriles and three of his accomplices in 2004 after they were granted an anti-Constitutional pardon by former Mafiosi President Mireya Moscoso.

• The first military aid to African governments
November 3.08
ON November 1, 1963, at a meeting in Bamako, the capital of Mali, President Ahmed Ben Bella and King Hassan II came to an agreement on the armistice that ended Morocco’s invasion of Algeria.

• FOR THE 17TH CONSECUTIVE OCCASION
Overwhelming UN General Assembly vote against blockade of Cuba
October.29.08
NEW YORK.—The UN General Assembly today approved by an overwhelming majority the resolution demanding an end of the U.S. blockade of Cuba, a vote passed by the Assembly over 17 years, the news agencies report.

• Cuban foreign minister at UN denounces U.S. lies
October.29.08
UNITED NATIONS—Cuban foreign minister Felipe Pérez Roque today denounced the lies spread by the United States when it claimed to have granted licenses for $250 million in food sales to the island after Cuba was hit by two hurricanes.
- President of General Assembly censures U.S. blockade of Cuba
- Blockade of health sector: Is it genocide?
- Frustration for U.S. investors
- Science magazine advocates a new era of Cuban-U.S. scientific cooperation

• Cuba to present condemnation of blockade to the UN
October.28.08
FOREIGN Minister Felipe Pérez Roque is in New York to present to the United Nations, on Wednesday October 29, Cuba’s resolution titled "The Necessity of Ending the Economic, Commercial and Financial Blockade Imposed by the United States of America against Cuba."

• Meeting with European Commissioner Louis Michel
October.24.08
Ricardo Cabrisas, vice president of the Council of State, yesterday afternoon received Louis Michel, European commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, who is visiting Havana. During the meeting, Cabrisas expressed his pleasure at dialoguing with the high-ranking official in the new stage of bilateral relations and noted that now is the time to work based on the agreed-upon foundations.
- Statement on the renewal of cooperation between the European Commission and the Republic of Cuba


• Cuban foreign minister begins official visit to Mexico
October.20.08
FOREIGN Minister Felipe Pérez Roque today begins an official visit to Mexico in response to an invitation from Patricia Espinosa Castellano, secretary of foreign affairs in that country.

• Raúl receives His Eminence Kirill
October.20.08
ON Sunday evening, General of the Army Raúl Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers, received at the Palace of the Revolution His Eminence Kirill, Metropolitan of Smolensk and Kalingrad, and president of the Moscow’s Patriarchate Religious Foreign Affairs Department.

• King Juan Carlos receives Cuban foreign minister
October.16.08
MADRID, October 14.— King Juan Carlos today received Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, who is on an official visit to Spain, Prensa Latina reports.

• Cuban delegation participates in PAHO Executive Board meeting in Washington
October.8.08
JOAQUIN García Salabarría, deputy minister of public health, is leading the Cuban delegation participating in the 48th Executive Board meeting of the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO) in Washington D.C.

• Senator arrested for corruption exposes Lincoln Díaz-Balart
October.8.08
MIAMI, October 7.— Puerto Rican Senator Jorge de Castro Font, arrested on October 2 by the FBI for corruption, has affirmed that he made a special visit to Florida in 2004 to deliver "a few little checks" of illegal donations to mafioso congress member Lincoln Díaz-Balart. In a statement reported by the newspaper Primera Hora, Castro Font says he took a trip on a private American Airlines plane to turn in the money to the mafioso congress member for the Fonalledas family, which owns Plaza Las Américas.

• Cuba welcomes upcoming Latin American-Caribbean Summit
October.7.08
RIO DE JANEIRO, October 6.—Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque today saluted Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, for his initiative of convening the Latin American-Caribbean Summit, scheduled for December 16-17th, PL reports.

• Blow to the blockade in the USA
October.7.08
IN the midst of the most devastating natural disasters experienced by Cuba in the last 50 years, and with diverse, well-known voices in the United States asking the White House to change its policy on the island, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice stood up in front of reporters and said that "now is not the time to lift the embargo (blockade)."

• The Barbados crime: no consolation
Posada Carriles is still free
October.6.08
THE trophies of the fencing team still lie at the bottom of the ocean. Those who lost their loved ones that October 6, 1976 have lived their lives marked by sorrow. There is no consolation. The word "absence" has been translated into a mixture of pain and anger. Anger because, 32 years later, the culprit "sleeps like a baby" and is freely strolling through the streets of Miami, while relatives of the victims are still demanding justice.

• Cuban foreign minister participates in meeting of Latin American and Caribbean foreign ministers
October.6.08
FOREIGN Minister Felipe Pérez Roque is heading a delegation from Cuba to a foreign ministers’ meeting in Rio de Janeiro today, October 6, leading up to the first Latin American and Caribbean Summit on Integration and Development.

• Europe’s economic health deteriorating
October.2.08
BRUSSELS, October 1.—The financial crisis is contributing to an economic slowdown in Europe, with poor growth perspectives and rising unemployment, putting the European Central Bank (ECB) under pressure to lower interest rates and maintain activity, AFP reports.

• Russian parliamentarian demands end of U.S. blockade of Cuba
September.30.08
MOSCOW, September 29.— Ivan Melnikov, the Russian vice president of Parliament, has called on the United States to end its economic, commercial and financial blockade of Cuba, in place for almost 50 years, and the repeal of the anti-Cuban Helms-Burton Act.

• Without political will, the Millennium Development Goals will not be achieved
September.26.08
THE Cuban first vice president took part in the UN roundtable discussion on education and health on Thursday, as part of the Millennium Development Goals meetings taking place within the framework of the 63rd UN General Assembly.

• Machado returns
September.25.08
FIRST Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura returned to Cuba on Thursday night after participating in an extensive program of activities in the context of the High-Level Segment of the 63rd session of the UN General Assembly.

• Cuba reaffirms NAM’s principles at UN General Assembly
September.25.08
JOSE Ramón Machado Ventura, Cuban first vice president, addressed the 63rd UN General Assembly and confirmed that the Non-Aligned Movement will continue to defend the interests of the Third World and promote the construction of a more just, democratic and solidarity-driven world, for which he urged developed countries not to forget their commitments to poor nations.
- Speech given by José Ramón Machado Ventura, first vice president of the Councils of State and Ministers to the 63^rd Session of the UN General, New York, September 24, 2008
- UN discussions continue

• Numerous messages of support and donations from the international community
September.24.08
DONATIONS that have been sent to our country are an expression of friendship and fraternity, and are being distributed free to those places and people most affected by Hurricanes Gustav and Ike, affirmed Ricardo Guerrero, deputy minister of foreign investment and economic cooperation. He said that to date, the island has received 230 offers of aid for a total of $30.5 million in kind, cash and cooperation projects from 63 countries and institutions. Of that total, Cuba has received about $1 million in resources and $2 million in financing.

• Medical attention guaranteed before, during and after the hurricanes
September.24.08
THE powerful Hurricanes Gustav and Ike caused varying degrees of damage to 1,356 healthcare facilities, the daily Granma reported on September 22, noting that the health care system’s humanism and strength were not affected before, during or after the hurricanes, and medical attention was guaranteed even in the most remote locations.

• High level segment of the 63rd Session of the UN General Assembly
Cuban first vice president speaks on first day
September.24.08
JOSÉ Ramón Machado Ventura took part in the inaugural session of the high- level segment of the 63rd session of the UN General Assembly this Tuesday.

• Cuban vice president calls for less rhetoric and more solidarity and cooperation with Africa
September.23.08
FIRST Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura and the delegation accompanying him at the 63rd Session of the UN General Assembly fulfilled an extensive agenda this Monday.

• International mobilization demands freedom for the Cuban Five
September.15.08
HAVANA, September 14.— The first public concert in solidarity with the Cuban Five, political prisoners in the United States, was held in New York with more than 600 spectators who demanded freedom for the anti-terrorist fighters.
- MIAMI 5  

• TEN YEARS AFTER THE FIVE’S ARREST
A new anti-Cuba spectacle in Miami
September 12.08
TEN years on from the operation unleashed by Miami’s FBI chief Héctor Pesquera at the request mafia ringleaders to eliminate Cubans infiltrated in their organizations, a new witch hunt is taking place in this city to foster hatred of the island, justify new operations against the Revolution and favor the interests of the Batista-loving Congress members in Florida.

• Atlanta Court rejects appeal of Cuban Five anti-terrorist case
September 5.08
THE 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta on September 2 denied the defense’s request for a hearing to reconsider the case of the five anti-terrorist Cubans, who will have spent a decade of illegal incarceration in the United States on September 12.

• Haiti: Hurricane Hanna kills 136
September 5.08
PORT AU PRINCE.—The number of people killed in Haiti in Hurricane Hanna’s passing has risen to 136, according to reports from civil defense authorities. The situation in the country is disastrous, with cities flooded, roads destroyed and thousands of people surrounded by water and mud and without food or drinking water, authorities said.

• Atlanta Court denied appeal in the case of the Cuban Five
September 4.08
We have just received the information that on September 2, 2008 the Atlanta  Court of Appeals denied our reconsideration request presented regarding our five compañeros imprisoned in the United States.

• Facing an imminent strike by Gustav
More than one million people flee New Orleans
September 1.08
NEW ORLEANS, August 31.— More than one million people fled Louisiana on Sunday as the devastating Hurricane Gustav headed towards New Orleans, the fragile coastal city in the United States, which is still suffering the ravages of 2005’s deadly Hurricane Katrina.

• Prepared to confront Gustav
August 30.08
PRESIDENT Raúl Castro has expressed his confidence in the skillful response of Pinar del Río to meteorological events in a telephone communication with authorities in the province. The president inquired about measures adopted and emphasized the imperative of safeguarding human lives and material goods.
- Gustav en route for the Isle of Youth with Category 3

• Gustav has caused close to 70 deaths in the Caribbean
August 29.08
PORT AU PRINCE.—At least 59 people died and seven are missing in Haiti in the wake of Hurricane Gustav, which had become a tropical storm on Friday morning, according to the EFE, which quoted an initial assessment from the Haitian Civil Defense authorities.
- Gustav heads towards Grand Cayman

• The Five send message to Cuban delegation in Beijing
August 21.08
THE Cuban Five, anti-terrorist fighters imprisoned in the United States, sent a message to the delegation of Cuban athletes participating in the 29th Olympic Games in Beijing. The letter, released on Wednesday night, was read out on the TV/radio “Roundtable” program. René González, Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino and Fernando González, said that they were following the competitions as much as they could, and that every medal won by Cuba’s athletes brings them the greatest joy and honor, knowing they represent our homeland with dignity.

• José Eduardo dos Santos receives General Leopoldo Cintra Frías
August 7.08
LUANDA.— President José Eduardo dos Santos of Angola received Army Corps General Leopoldo Cintra Frías, a member of the Political Bureau of Communist Party of Cuba, with whom he discussed matters related to increasing relations between the two countries, according to local news reports.

• Esteban Lazo receives Suriname foreign minister
August 5.08
ESTEBAN Lazo Hernández, vice president of the Council of State and member of the Political Bureau of the Party, yesterday received Mrs. Lygia Louise Irene Kraag–Keteldijk, foreign minister of the Republic of Suriname, and her accompanying delegation, as they arrived for an official visit to Cuba. During their meeting, the two sides discussed the situation in their respective countries and agreed to continue strengthening and developing relations, particularly in the energy savings program, education and other areas.
 
• Call from Spain in support of the Five
August 4.08
THE eminent poet Marcos Ana, a symbol of anti-fascist culture, heads the list of a group of Spanish former political prisoners who have signed a call for solidarity with the cause of the five Cuban anti-terrorists incarcerated since 1998 in U.S. jails.

• Ill-kept secrets
August 1.08
USING temptation, among other methods, to divide the ranks, representatives of industrialized nations to the World Trade Organization (WTO) each worked in his or her own way — sometimes together — toward the same goal; that is, ceding only what was convenient and changing everything to what they wanted.

• "INDEPENDENT" LIBRARIANS WITH CIA FINANCING
Now Kent will have to explain his ties with the swindler Calzón
August 1.08
ROBERT Kent, owner of the Friends of Cuban Libraries organization, plans to be in Quebec City for the World Library and Information Congress, to continue his slandering of Cuba.

• NON-ALIGNED MOVEMENT MINISTERIAL MEETING
We will have what we are capable of achieving together
July 30.08
TEHRAN.—Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque affirmed that his country will continue the battle to democratize international relations in a world where increasingly more serious challenges are being posed to the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).

• G8 Summit offers few alternatives in the face of global crisis
July 8.08
TOKYO – The G8 Summit of the world’s eight most industrialized nations underway in Hokaido, Japan is entering its second day marked by the challenge of finding solutions to the world energy and food crisis.

• Parliamentarians from continent call for freedom for the Five
July 8.08
IN Panama, parliamentarians from 15 Latin American and Caribbean nations called on the U.S. government yesterday to immediately release the five Cuban anti-terrorists imprisoned in that country since 1998. The demand is part of the statement issued by a continental meeting in Panama on Monday in solidarity with Cuba and the cause of those five anti-terrorist fighters. They note that on September 12, these Cubans will have completed 10 years of unjust incarceration in the United States for the sole action of fighting to prevent aggression from U.S.-based terrorist groups.

• Pastors for Peace Caravan crosses into Mexico
July 4.08
MEXICO.- The U.S. Pastors for Peace Caravan carrying aid to donate to Cuba in solidarity, entered Mexico on July 4th after facing a number of obstacles imposed by authorities.

• Pastors for Peace defy U.S. restrictions on travel to Cuba
July 3.08
HAVANA, July 2. — Members of the 19th Pastors for Peace Caravan were continuing preparations to travel to Cuba, in open defiance of the restrictions imposed by the United States government, Prensa Latina reported.

• Lula welcomes president of Cuban National Assembly
July 3.08
BRASILIA, July 2.— The president of Cuba’s National Assembly, Ricardo Alarcón, was received in this capital city by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. PL reports that also participating in the exchange were Foreign Minister Celso Amorim who had previously met with Alarcón...

• Belgian Foreign Minister supports freedom for five Cuban anti-terrorists
June 30.08
BRUSSELS, JUNE 29 (PL).— Belgian Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht asserted that his country fully supports a United Nations working group’s 2005 demand that the United States immediately release five Cuban anti-terrorists imprisoned in that country. A statement from Katrien Demuynck, president of the Belgian committee and coordinator of the European campaign to Free the Five, reported that De Gucht said his country hopes to inform European Union delegates about the case.

• June 14: Che’s 80th birthday
A brief personal look at Che Guevara
June 13.08
IT was Pope John Paul II’s custom to travel accompanied by journalists who would report later on the trip. During the flight, at some point the Pope would go to the cabin where the journalists were and talk with them for a while.

• The mafioso record of the terrorist Montaner
June 12.08
CARLOS Alberto Montaner is going to get hives. The loudest pseudo-intellectual kept by the CIA in its stable is circulating a document over the Internet, presenting it as a replica of revelations about his terrorist past.

• Parliament’s Foreign Relations Commission condemns Atlanta court ruling against the Cuban Five
June 12.08
THE Cuban Parliament’s Foreign Relations Commission yesterday unanimously approved a statement condemning the ruling issued by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, in which a panel of three judges upheld the convictions of five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters imprisoned in the United States and the sentences of two of these men, while mandating the cases of the other three for re-sentencing in a new hearing in Miami.

• Fidel sends appreciation to doctors who provided aid in China
June 10.08
Cuban internationalists attended some 1,000 earthquake victims in Sichuan. THE leader of the Revolution, Fidel Castro, sent a certificate of appreciation to the members of Cuba’s Henry Reeve Medical Brigade who went to the People’s Republic of China to bring aid after the May 12 earthquake there.

• The U.S. government has much to learn from Cuba and is in no position to lecture anybody
June 9.08
ON June 4, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice presented her annual report on human trafficking for 2008, in which, for the sixth consecutive year, the United States government included Cuba among the countries it accuses of not making significant efforts to confront the alleged trafficking of women and children for the purpose of sexual exploitation, and described our country as a sexual tourism destination, among other serious and unfounded accusations.

• Message from Gerardo
We are going to resist until justice is done
June 6.08
AFTER learning of the decision of the Appeals Court in Atlanta to uphold his sentence of a double life term plus 15 years, Gerardo Hernández spoke on the phone with Alicia Jrapko, and this is the message that the activist transmitted to us:
Gerardo has just called me, he already knew about the court’s decision.
- Press release responding to Atlanta Appeals Court ruling

• Mercenary NGOs meet in Washington
USAID reveals its plans for subversion in Cuba
June 6.08
IN its new plans for destabilizing Cuba, the USAID is to promote the clandestine dispatch of electronic materials to the island via European and Latin American intermediaries, which will undertake the dirty work that it cannot legally do: to send agents into the country under cover of so-called humanitarian licenses in order to make on-the-ground evaluations, and to guarantee their collaborators that their activities will never be divulged, over and above the Freedom of Information Act.

• EXAMPLE OF SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION
Cuba and Brazil supplied vaccines to African countries with meningitis emergencies
June 6.08
Two institutes, the Finlay in Havana and Bio-Manguinhos Technology and Immunobiology in Rio de Janeiro, respond to WHO request to cover shortage of AC anti-meningococcal vaccine after pharmaceutical corporations cut its production

• PERU
Another hinge for U.S. military penetration?
June 6.08
IN order to maintain its imperialist power in Latin America and the Caribbean, the United States is being forced to steadily extend its military presence there, given that its political wing, the old domestic party system, is foundering in the region. In addition to continuing its multimillionaire aid for Plan Colombia as a springboard for interference in the continent and fast-tracking the Plan Merida to the same end, that is sufficient motive for needing new countries that, with the consent of their leaders and given the due moment, could be used as a hinge to open up their national territory to aggression against those countries opposed to the empire’s dictates.

• Thousands of Puerto Ricans demand the right to independence
June 6.08
SAN JUAN, June 1.— Thousands of Puerto Ricans flooded the streets of the San Juan historical district today to demand their right to independence, and to oppose the internal elections of the U.S. Democratic Party, won in this so-called free associated state the same day by Senator Hillary Clinton, although her rival, Barack Obama, is still leading the race to be the party’s candidate in the November presidential election.

• The current situation is not a food shortage, but death by hunger
June 5.08
ROME, June 4.— "Independently of the final declaration of the Summit, we have seen dissatisfaction with the food crisis on the part of the representatives of the peoples here; it is clear that there is no tolerance. Solutions are imperative," said Cuban First Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura, assessing the outcome of the FAO Summit that concludes this Thursday, June 5 in Rome.

• 11th Circuit Court upholds convictions of the Five
June 5.08
A Federal Appeals Court on Wednesday upheld the convictions of the five Cuban anti-terrorists incarcerated in the United States since 1998, while vacating the sentences of three of them, who are to be re-sentenced in Miami, the only place they never should have been or should be tried.
- MIAMI 5  

• FAO Summit
Cuba demands: no demagogy, hypocrisy or false promises
June 4.08
ROME, June 3.—The voice of Cuba was heard yesterday afternoon when First Vice President José Ramón Machado Ventura addressed dozens of heads of state and government, close to 100 ministers and other officials convened by the FAO to its High-Level Conference on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bio-energy, which opened on Tuesday in the Italian capital.
- Complete text of the speech

• FAO criticizes rich countries at Rome Summit
June 3.08
ROME (PL).—At a remove from protocol and in incisive language, Jacques Diouf, director-general of the FAO, criticized rich countries on Tuesday for turning their backs and allowing the world food crisis to grow.

• Fidel sends message to Hospital No. 1 in Chengdu
May 28.08
CHENGDU, China, May 27 (PL). — Cuban leader Fidel Castro sent a message today to Hospital No. 1 in Chengdu, in Sichuan province, to tell staff there that they could count on the island’s medical brigade for as long as necessary. Doctor José Rodríguez, head of the brigade, transmitted that message during a meeting with the hospital’s director, Doctor Li Yuan Feng.

• Reflections of Fidel
Martí’s inmortal ideas
May 23.08
JUST a few days ago, a friend of mine sent me the text of a report from Gallup, the well-known U.S. opinion pollster. I started to leaf through the material with the natural lack of confidence given the lying and hypocritical information usually used against our nation.

• U.S. Interests Section: coordinator of subversion
May 21.08
PART TWO of the Radio/TV program "Roundtable," broadcast on Tuesday night, gave further examples of the repugnant behavior of the members of counterrevolutionary groups, who have made a daily practice of lying in their ambitions to gain prominence and, above all, a lot of money.

• Deaths from earthquake rise to 8,500 in China
May 12.08
BEIJING.—As of midnight Monday, the total number of deaths caused by the earthquake in southwest China had risen to 8,533, according to official sources.

• We are facing a humanitarian drama of incalculable consequences
May 8.08
Dear Commander Daniel Ortega, president of Nicaragua.
Distinguished presidents and high-ranking representatives:
THE figures are more than eloquent. In 2005 we paid $250 to import one ton of rice; now we are paying $1,050, four times as much.

• Raúl meets with the Emir of Qatar
May 1.08
RAUL Castro Ruz, president of the Councils of State and Ministers, received on April 30 His Highness Sheik Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani, emir of the state of Qatar, who is on a working visit to the island.

• Reflections of Fidel
Our spirit of sacrifice and the empire’s extortion
April 25.08
THE first report I saw came from the Italian news agency ANSA on April 22.
"La Paz, April 22.— A commission of deputies are to investigate the case of Bolivian scholarship student who died in Cuba, and whose body was repatriated without several vital organs, including the brain.

• FBI repression of Puerto Rican pro-independence activists denounced
April 25. 2008
THE Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP) has denounced the continuous repression and harassment by U.S. government agents of Puerto Rican pro-independence activists since the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) harassment of Miguel Viqueira and Tania Delgado.

• 1st International Conference on Security and Defense in Havana
Mahathir Mohamad, former prime minister of Malaysia speaks
April 25.08
THE first International Conference on Security and Defense has taken place in Havana with the participation of close to 100 specialists from 10 Latin American, European, African and Asian countries.

• Education minister replaced
April 25.08
AT the proposal of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, the Council of State has agreed to replace Education Minister Luis Ignacio Gómez Gutiérrez, promoting in his place Ana Elsa Velázquez Cobiella, currently rector of the Frank País García Higher Pedagogical Institute in Santiago de Cuba, according to an official note issued at the close of this edition.

• Castilla-La Mancha explores possibilities for healthcare cooperation
April 25.08
A delegation from the Community Council of Castilla-La Mancha, led by Dr. Roberto Sabrido Bermúdez, visited Havana to explore possibilities for cooperation within the healthcare sector.

• FITCUBA 2008 dedicated to culture/tourism integration
April 25. 2008
THE 28th International Tourism Fair, FITCUBA 2008, will take place from May 8 to 9 at the Morro-Cabaña National Park in Havana, with the central theme "Culture/Tourism Integration."

• Reflections of Fidel
Peace and prosperity
April 21.08
POPE Benedict XVI outshone Brown, the British Prime Minister, who replaced Blair, whom I met and spoke with for a few minutes during a recess at the WTO Second Conference in Geneva 10 years ago; it was following his speech and I was expressing my disagreement on the matter of an incorrect sentence he used about the social situation of British children.

• Statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Cuba denounces Bush’s complicity with Posada Carriles
April 21.08
THIS May 8 marks one year since the definitive liberation of terrorist Luis Posada Carriles in the United States. At the time, that was the ruling of Judge Kathleen Cardone, who threw out the charges brought against Posada by the U.S. government.

• Reflections of Fidel
Making no concessions to enemy ideology
April 16.08
I have decided to write this reflection after listening to a public comment disseminated by one of the media of the Revolution, which I will not specifically mention.We must be very careful about the assertions we make, in order not to play into our enemy’s ideology.

• Reflections of Fidel
Bush, millionaires, consumption and under-consumption
April 14.08
NOBODY should require additional proof of the growing hatred that is fueling the slaughter in Iraq, a country where 95 percent of the population is Muslim —of these, over 60 percent are Shiites and the remainder Sunnis—or the killings in Afghanistan, where over 99 percent of the population is also Muslim —80 percent Sunni and the remainder Shiite.

• In UNESCO, Bolivia recommends Cuban literacy method
April 14.08
PARIS.— In UNESCO this Monday, Bolivia highlighted its government’s efforts to wipe out illiteracy with the help of Cuba and it’s "Yes, I Can Do It!" literacy method.

• Branch of the ALBA Bank opens in Havana
April 10.08
THE first branch of the ALBA (Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas) Bank has opened in Havana, in what constitutes another advance of that regional integration project, based on economic complementariness and solidarity.

• Crisis and looting in Haiti; Préval calls for calm
April 10.08
PORT-AU-PRINCE, April 9.—Haitian President René Préval made a call for calm on Wednesday, while the country, the poorest on the American continent, remained submerged in an outbreak of violence and looting, after an abrupt increase in the prices of essential goods.

• Reflections of Fidel
Bush, war and the tooth-and-nail struggle for survival
April 8.08
IN the reflection titled "Bush in Heaven," published by our newspapers this past March 23, I affirmed that Bush would get up to his old tricks during the NATO meeting in the Romanian capital of Bucharest, from April 1 through 3.
- ReflectionsoF Fidel

• Cuba is facing the threat of global warning with determination, the UNDP affirms
April 3.08
THE certain and immediate danger to the planet and the human species posed by global warming to the atmosphere is the central issue of the Human Development Report (HDR) 2007/2008, issued by the United Nations Development Programme, titled "Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world."

• Reflections of Fidel
The Chinese victory (Part II)
April 2.08
WHEN World War I broke out in 1914, China joined the allies. As recompense, China was promised that the German concessions in the province of Shandong would be returned to them at the end of the war. After the Treaty of Versailles, which President Woodrow Wilson imposed on friends and foes alike, the German colonies were transferred to Japan, a more powerful ally than China.

• Cuba to extend medical collaboration to 81 countries
April 1.08
CUBA is to extend services provided by its medical personnel to 81 countries during the year, announced Alberto González, director of the Ministry of Public Health’s Central Cooperation Unit. González reported that work has begun to prepare new groups of collaborators who will travel to countries such as the Solomon Islands in the Pacific Ocean.

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