Venezuela has sent a fourth ship to Cuba with 27 containers of humanitarian aid to help repair the extensive damage caused by Hurricane Melissa at the end of October, official sources reported on Wednesday.
The Ministry of Transportation announced on its Instagram account that the vessel set sail on December 9 with “household products and construction materials.”
It specified that this aid will facilitate recovery from the devastation caused by Hurricane Melissa and is “within the framework of ALBA-CP in order to promote cooperation among the nations of the region.”
This is the fifth shipment that the Bolivarian Republic has sent to Cuba since Hurricane Melissa made landfall on October 29 as a Category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale.
The storm hit the provinces of Santiago de Cuba, Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma, and Guantánamo hard, causing extensive damage to electrical, housing, and agricultural infrastructure.
Official figures reported 76,689 homes affected, 4,743 of which were completely destroyed, while thousands of hectares of crops were devastated, along with hundreds of kilometers of roads and power lines.
Venezuela sent its first shipment of humanitarian aid, consisting of 26 tons, by air the day after the hurricane struck. On November 8, the ALBA ship transported 5,000 tons of aid and a brigade of electrical workers.
On November 10, 22 Venezuelan specialists in the electrical, transportation, and public works sectors traveled to the area, and that same day, a second ship departed with just over 2,500 tons of humanitarian aid.
A third ship carrying over 7,110 tons of humanitarian aid set sail on November 28 from the international port of La Guaira, in the northern state of the same name, with 76 containers of food, backhoes, and supplies for housing and road repairs.
The executive secretary of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America-Peoples’ Trade Treaty (ALBA-TPP), Rander Peña, told the press at the time that the total amount of supplies sent to Cuba exceeded 12,000 tons, including food, household goods, mattresses, medicine, construction and electrical materials, toys, and other items.
On his Telegram account, the Deputy Foreign Minister for Latin America stated that sending a ship with vital supplies for the Cuban people honors the centennial of the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, and his enduring legacy, affirming that: “Solidarity is not about giving what is left over, but about sharing what you have.”
[ SOURCE: PRENSA LATINA ]
