[News] Fidel Castro Calls Protest March, Slams US Provocations

[Anti-Imperialist News]

FIDEL on Saturday: Cuba in transition: from darkness to light:
http://www.granma.cubaweb.cu/secciones/ingles/noticias/art22.html)
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Fidel Castro Calls Protest March, Slams US Provocations

Havana, Jan 22 (AIN) Fidel Castro called for a Protest March on
Tuesday, January 24 in front of the US Interests Section in Havana to
counter new US aggressions against Cuba.

The demonstration will take place the same day that US authorities
are scheduled to hold a hearing to revise the immigration status of
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles in El Paso, Texas, said Fidel Castro
in a nationwide television and radio address on Sunday evening.

Havana residents will protest US maneuvers to release the criminal
wanted in Venezuela for having blown up a Cuban passenger plane and
killing all 73 persons on board, he noted.

"Cubans will also denounce the threat the fraudulent and illegitimate
US administration poses to the world", said Fidel Castro.

The leader of the Cuban Revolution described as provocative and
vulgar the electronic messages on a screen perched on the front wall
of the US Interests Section building in Havana.

The insulting US action, plus the possible release of renowned
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles are more than enough reasons to stage
a demonstration in front of the US Interests Section, said Fidel
Castro.

The electronic screen was hung on the outside of the building on
January 16 and it has displayed excerpts of the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights and the ideas of Martin Luther King.

The use of phrases by King and excerpts on human rights excerpts is a
crude insult by the US government, which Fidel described as a
torturer, assassin and murderer.

President Castro quoted statements by personalities that have joined
denunciations against the torture practiced against detainees at the
US naval base in the illegally occupied Cuban territory of
Guantanamo.

The detention process and torture in Guantanamo are inadmissible and
have become a symbol of the sinister justice system of the United
States, read some of the statements cited by Fidel Castro.

In regards to the screen on the US Interests Section building in
Havana, the Cuban Foreign Ministry delivered a protest note to
Washington, which attempted to refute it by alleging that it is a way
to break what it called an information blockade existing in Cuba.

Fidel Castro gave a detailed explanation on different subversive
activities carried out by the director of the US Interests Section,
Michael Parmley, since he arrived in Havana last September. He said
under the pretext of marking International Human Rights Day last
December 10, Parmley invited counterrevolutionary elements to his
office in order to jump-start the Bush administration’s so-called
"Transition Plan for a Democratic Cuba".



Fidel Castro Rejects US Accusations against Cuba

Havana, Jan 22 (AIN) Cuban President Fidel Castro strongly rejected
accusations by the Bush administration and Miami-based anti-Cuba
groups aimed at discrediting the island.

During a TV appearance on Sunday, President Castro said White House
spokespersons and representatives of counterrevolutionary circles in
the US try to damage the reputation of Cuba’s economic and social
achievements.

They dare say that Cuba is way behind on human rights and they say
they are worried about Cuba’s relations with Iran, since it
constitutes "a threat to US National Security and Latin American
stability".

President Castro read a list of new provocations and declarations
against Cuba, some stemming from the US Interests Section in Havana.
He said that the White House, with no sense of shame, spreads fear in
many parts of the world while it accuses the Cuban government of
racism.

He said the Bush administration could be compared to the Ku Klux Klan
if it rejects the Cuban offer of free eye surgery to 150,000 poor and
black US citizens and he asked if the US empire was able to send
thousands of doctors to Africa, Pakistan and Latin America like Cuba.

The provocations mentioned by the Cuban Commander-in-Chief included
President Bush´s extolling the support of the Czech Republic of the
Cuban people´s "dream" of living in a free country.

He also referred to the December 19 meeting of US Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice with the Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba in
order to analyze a group of steps or suggestions aimed at stepping up
the so-called transition in Cuba.

Even on immigration policy, Washington stiffens its aggressive policy
since it declared a national emergency regarding Cuba on January 10
to further limit trips by tourist boats to the island as a measure to
prevent Cuba from getting financial resources and thus strengthen the
over-40-year economic blockade, said Fidel Castro.

He cited recent demands by the Cuban-American mafia circles that
include the use of military force to topple the Cuban Revolution,
putting the Cuban President on trial in a US court, and the handing
over of properties nationalized by Cuba at the beginning of the
revolution to their alleged owners.

The anti-Cuba groups --with top level influence in the Bush
administration--also insist on improving illegal TV and Radio Marti
broadcasts to the island by using military planes and satellites in
order to get by the successful jamming by Cuba.

The Cuban-American mafia also insists that any republican candidate
to contest the 2008 presidential elections will be denied their
financial support if he or she does not take into account the
strengthening of the blockade against Cuba.



Cuba Offers Free Eye-Surgery for 150,000 US Patients

Havana, January 22 (AIN) Cuban President Fidel Castro offered free
eye-surgery for 150,000 poor US citizens including air transportation
and their accommodations on the island.

President Castro made the announcement during a TV appearance on
Sunday, which is part of a series of live appearances in which the
Cuban leader provided details on the energy revolution underway in
Cuba, an initiative he says will save one billion dollars annually.

He said the eye patients could travel to Florida from where they
would be brought to Cuba by plane.

President Castro said he took on the offer of free eye-surgery for
100,000 US people made by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez during a
recent visit to New York. Fidel said he decided to add another 50,000
and ask the US organization Pastors for Peace to choose poor people
from any religion, political trend or that simply need the treatment.

The Cuban leader said that by practicing 500 daily eye surgeries all
those 150,000 US citizens can receive the benefit of recovering their
sight in just a 300-day period.

Cuba has all the equipment and specialized personnel considered among
the best specialists in the world, said Fidel. He asked if the US
government would prohibit those people from traveling to the island
and sentence them to blindness.

Fidel Castro said such eye-operations by no means bring any financial
benefit to the Cuban government and he recalled that Florida is
closer to Cuba than countries like Guyana or Grenada, also benefiting
from the Operation Miracle eye-surgery program.

He recalled that tens of thousands of people from 22 South and
Central American nations have been benefited by Cuban health
services.

"Will the United States fine those sick US citizens for coming to
Cuba for eye surgery?", Fidel asked in direct reference to the
arbitrary fines imposed by the Bush administration on US citizens
that have traveled to Cuba.

In that respect he recalled that during November the US Treasury sent
letters to some 200 members of the Venceremos Brigade and to Pastors
for Peace requesting information on their latest trips to Cuba, as an
initial step that could lead to the imposition of heavy fines.

Thousands of other US citizens have been threatened with huge fines
if they violate Washington’s travel ban, said Fidel Castro.

The Cuban leader then went on to denounce ongoing US maneuvers to
release terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, author of the 1976 bombing of
a Cubana airliner that claimed 73 innocent lives.

Posada, 77, is only charged with illegal entry to US territory and he
could be released following a hearing slated for January 24 in El
Paso, Texas, where the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Office
will revise his status in the US.

Posada Carriles, a naturalized Venezuelan citizen, is wanted in
Caracas to stand trial in the plane bombing, but the US government
has ignored its longstanding extradition treaty with the South
American country.

In his speech, Fidel described as a strange coincidence the recent
exhibition of a German documentary that tries to accuse Cuba for the
assassination of former US President John F. Kennedy. He called the
film a total fabrication of the CIA.

He also referred to other aggressions mounted by the Bush
administration against the island, including a committee for the
so-called democratic transition in Cuba, which has been assigned a
huge budget for subversive activities against the island.

Fidel Castro said that Cuba is the most stable country in the world
while the Bush administration has the largest number of criminals in
an empire similar to the one Adolph Hitler dreamed of.

The Cuban President noted the 500 billion dollar war budget approved
in the United States, a considerable part of the total 2.6 trillion
dollar annual budget. He pointed out that the growing fiscal deficit
is balanced with the money deposited in US banks by Third World
Nations.

Fidel Castro also said that the US budget includes nearly 38 million
dollars dedicated to anti-Cuba radio and TV transmissions, and
includes a 10 million dollar increase in order to purchase a plane to
beam such illegal transmissions to the island.




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