“Our peoples will not have a future without unity and integration”
Raúl Castro Ruz
President of the Council of State and Ministers
Republic of Cuba
Fifteenth Ordinary Summit of the
Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA)
Caracas, Venezuela
March 5, 2018
Translated by Charles McKelvey
Raúl Castro Ruz
President of the Council of State and Ministers
Republic of Cuba
Fifteenth Ordinary Summit of the
Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA)
Caracas, Venezuela
March 5, 2018
Translated by Charles McKelvey
Comrade Nicolás Madruo Moros, President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela;
Esteemed Heads of State and of Government;
Esteemed heads of delegations and invited guests:
This March 5, a day in which we commemorate the fifth anniversary of the death of President Hugo Chávez Fríaz, founder with Fidel of ALBA, my first words are directed to reaffirm our homage to his work and his example as well as our unwavering loyalty to his legacy.
Today, the united defense of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is the strategic and urgent task of ALBA.
The military threat, the hostility, and the economic aggression of imperialism; the neoliberal attack to reverse social gains; the interference in the sovereignty of progressive governments; and the attempts to dismantle the progress of Latin American and Caribbean integration destabilize the region, and they create dangers to regional peace and security.
The United States, since 1999, when Commander Hugo Chávez arrived to the presidency, and even more when Nicolás Maduro became President, has turned to the methods characteristic of non-conventional war, with the objective of breaking Venezuela, the owner of immense natural resources coveted by imperialism. President Donald Trump has just renewed the executive order that declares Venezuela an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. These [U.S.] threats against peace and stability in Venezuela represent a threat as well to the stability and peace of the region.
Some appear to have forgotten the lessons of the past, of the cruel years of military dictatorships and the impact of neoliberalism. They intend to reestablish the policies of blackmail, humiliation, and isolation, with their sad consequences for our region; policies that have, as before, the United States as their principle organizer.
They announce to us openly the full validity and standing of the Monroe Doctrine, which proclaims colonial subordination to the governments and corporations of Washington, and which, as Bolivar warned, plagued Our America with pain and misery in the name of freedom.
They again underestimate our peoples.
We proclaim our unwavering support for the Bolivarian Revolution and the civil-military union of its people, led by its president, comrade Nicolás Maduro Moros.
We condemn the unilateral coercive measures and foreign interference against the Bolivarian and Chavist process, with destabilizing aims, that threaten peace and dialogue among Venezuelans and create shortages for the population. Cease the economic aggression against Venezuela in order that its people can enjoy the rights attained by their Revolution.
We reject the exclusion of President Nicolás Maduro from the Eighth Summit of the Americas. This illegal decision is unacceptable and interventionist, and at the same time, it brings the hemisphere back to a period that it appeared to have gone beyond. Exclusion contributes absolutely nothing to peace, dialogue, or hemispheric understanding.
It is inadmissible that a group of countries, without right or mandate, pretend to speak for the region and serve as an instrument for aggression against a member of the Latin American and Caribbean family. They use as a pretext a supposed rupture of the democratic order, precisely in a country that has developed more than twenty electoral processes; and which now has convoked presidential elections, as was previously demanded with even by violent means.
Why do they not denounce the covert coups d’état, the massacres, the forced disappearances that the peoples of the region suffer?
Nor do we recognize the discredited Organization of American States as having any moral authority to give lessons on democracy, governability, or constitutionality.
The postulates of the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a zone of peace, signed by the Chiefs of State and Government of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Sates at its Second Summit in Havana, are being violated. Responsibility for full compliance with the obligation of non-interference, direct or indirect, in the internal affairs of any other state; and with the obligation of respecting the principles of national sovereignty, the equality of rights, and the free determination of peoples; is being evaded.
The only solution to the problems of Venezuelans is in the hands of Venezuelans themselves.
Esteemed comrades: I speak in the name of our Revolution and of our people, as will speak tomorrow from this position* any other Cuban patriot, who always will know, as Fidel believed, that “our people will not have a future without unity and integration.”
Bolívar and Martí, Fidel and Chávez, left us invaluable teachings, among them loyalty to principles. Their lessons show us the direction to follow in this decisive hour for the Greater Country [of Latin America and the Caribbean], which demands of us unity, in order to forge together our second and definitive independence.
* Raúl refers to his position as President of the Council of State and Ministers of the Republic of Cuba. He has publically stated that, with the completion of his present term of office, he will have completed his final task and duty. A newly elected National Assembly of Popular Power will convene on April 19, 2018. One of its first duties will be to elect the thirty-one members of the Council of State and Ministers, including its President. The National Assembly is constituted through a process of neighborhood nomination assemblies and a system of direct and indirect elections, which have been conducted by national, provincial, and municipal electoral commissions from September 4, 2017 to March 11, 2018, in accordance with the Cuban Constitution of 1976.
Esteemed Heads of State and of Government;
Esteemed heads of delegations and invited guests:
This March 5, a day in which we commemorate the fifth anniversary of the death of President Hugo Chávez Fríaz, founder with Fidel of ALBA, my first words are directed to reaffirm our homage to his work and his example as well as our unwavering loyalty to his legacy.
Today, the united defense of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela is the strategic and urgent task of ALBA.
The military threat, the hostility, and the economic aggression of imperialism; the neoliberal attack to reverse social gains; the interference in the sovereignty of progressive governments; and the attempts to dismantle the progress of Latin American and Caribbean integration destabilize the region, and they create dangers to regional peace and security.
The United States, since 1999, when Commander Hugo Chávez arrived to the presidency, and even more when Nicolás Maduro became President, has turned to the methods characteristic of non-conventional war, with the objective of breaking Venezuela, the owner of immense natural resources coveted by imperialism. President Donald Trump has just renewed the executive order that declares Venezuela an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. These [U.S.] threats against peace and stability in Venezuela represent a threat as well to the stability and peace of the region.
Some appear to have forgotten the lessons of the past, of the cruel years of military dictatorships and the impact of neoliberalism. They intend to reestablish the policies of blackmail, humiliation, and isolation, with their sad consequences for our region; policies that have, as before, the United States as their principle organizer.
They announce to us openly the full validity and standing of the Monroe Doctrine, which proclaims colonial subordination to the governments and corporations of Washington, and which, as Bolivar warned, plagued Our America with pain and misery in the name of freedom.
They again underestimate our peoples.
We proclaim our unwavering support for the Bolivarian Revolution and the civil-military union of its people, led by its president, comrade Nicolás Maduro Moros.
We condemn the unilateral coercive measures and foreign interference against the Bolivarian and Chavist process, with destabilizing aims, that threaten peace and dialogue among Venezuelans and create shortages for the population. Cease the economic aggression against Venezuela in order that its people can enjoy the rights attained by their Revolution.
We reject the exclusion of President Nicolás Maduro from the Eighth Summit of the Americas. This illegal decision is unacceptable and interventionist, and at the same time, it brings the hemisphere back to a period that it appeared to have gone beyond. Exclusion contributes absolutely nothing to peace, dialogue, or hemispheric understanding.
It is inadmissible that a group of countries, without right or mandate, pretend to speak for the region and serve as an instrument for aggression against a member of the Latin American and Caribbean family. They use as a pretext a supposed rupture of the democratic order, precisely in a country that has developed more than twenty electoral processes; and which now has convoked presidential elections, as was previously demanded with even by violent means.
Why do they not denounce the covert coups d’état, the massacres, the forced disappearances that the peoples of the region suffer?
Nor do we recognize the discredited Organization of American States as having any moral authority to give lessons on democracy, governability, or constitutionality.
The postulates of the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a zone of peace, signed by the Chiefs of State and Government of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Sates at its Second Summit in Havana, are being violated. Responsibility for full compliance with the obligation of non-interference, direct or indirect, in the internal affairs of any other state; and with the obligation of respecting the principles of national sovereignty, the equality of rights, and the free determination of peoples; is being evaded.
The only solution to the problems of Venezuelans is in the hands of Venezuelans themselves.
Esteemed comrades: I speak in the name of our Revolution and of our people, as will speak tomorrow from this position* any other Cuban patriot, who always will know, as Fidel believed, that “our people will not have a future without unity and integration.”
Bolívar and Martí, Fidel and Chávez, left us invaluable teachings, among them loyalty to principles. Their lessons show us the direction to follow in this decisive hour for the Greater Country [of Latin America and the Caribbean], which demands of us unity, in order to forge together our second and definitive independence.
* Raúl refers to his position as President of the Council of State and Ministers of the Republic of Cuba. He has publically stated that, with the completion of his present term of office, he will have completed his final task and duty. A newly elected National Assembly of Popular Power will convene on April 19, 2018. One of its first duties will be to elect the thirty-one members of the Council of State and Ministers, including its President. The National Assembly is constituted through a process of neighborhood nomination assemblies and a system of direct and indirect elections, which have been conducted by national, provincial, and municipal electoral commissions from September 4, 2017 to March 11, 2018, in accordance with the Cuban Constitution of 1976.