Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel affirmed on Thursday that, despite the difficulties and pressure tactics employed by the United States, surrender is not an option for the Caribbean nation.
“There are many worthy Cuban men and women who gave their lives for this country, for the independence of this country throughout history,” he emphasized during an extensive press conference with national and international media.
In that regard, he paid tribute to “the 32 comrades who fell in Venezuela,” whose actions, he said, are a lesson in dignity and sovereignty.
Díaz-Canel denounced the fact that Cuba has not received fuel since December due to the tightening of the blockade against Venezuela, creating a complex situation that affects electricity generation and basic economic and social activities.
In response, he detailed a plan that includes updating the directives for the Special Period on energy conservation, increasing the extraction and refining of domestic crude oil, expanding the manufactured gas service, and accelerating the transition to renewable energy sources through the installation of photovoltaic systems.
On the international stage, Díaz-Canel expressed his gratitude for the immediate support of China, Russia, the Non-Aligned Movement, and other global actors, asserting that “Cuba is not alone,” and called on the Global South to mobilize against “hegemony and anti-fascism.”
The Cuban president also reiterated the island’s willingness to engage in dialogue with the United States “without preconditions and on equal footing,” while defending the country’s sovereign right to prepare for defense under the doctrine of a people’s war.
During his address, the president noted that the nation faces pressures “unlike anything else in the world, much less for such a prolonged period,” but resists with creativity and defends the ideas it believes in, confident of victory.
“We, all generations of Cubans, from the early years of the Revolution to the present day, our grandchildren, our children, were born and have lived under a blockade, and we were born under the signs of this economic strangulation,” he recalled.
According to the Cuban president, the United States has tried to characterize the Cuban situation with the theory of the failed state, associated with one of the tactics the U.S. government is pursuing to overthrow the Cuban Revolution: economic strangulation.
Diaz-Canel also revealed that terrorist actions against Cuba are being organized and financed from Washington and announced that details of these plans will be revealed soon.
Regarding ties with the Bolivarian Republic, Díaz-Canel affirmed that Cuba is prepared to continue its collaboration with Venezuela in light of the new scenario imposed by the United States’ aggression and the illegal kidnapping of the Venezuelan head of state.
The Cuban president noted that economic and commercial ties, as well as collaborative projects between the two nations, including those in the energy sector, have been forged over years and have benefited both countries and others in the region through ALBA-TCP and Petrocaribe.
“The future of relations with Venezuela,” he said, “lies in how we are able to build upon the current situation of a Venezuela that has been attacked, whose president and wife were illegally kidnapped and are being held in a US prison.”
[ SOURCE: PRENSA LATINA ]
