People's Democracy

We are greatly pleased to convey the most fraternal and solidarity greetings of the Cuban communists to the delegates to the 18th congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), a powerful organisation that represents the loftiest ideals of dedication and uprightness of the brotherly people of India, to whom we are bound by historical feelings of friendship.

We admire the courageous and heroic struggle that the CPI(M) has waged throughout its fertile history in defense of the rights and well being of the workers and the dispossessed popular masses, as well as its steadfast stand in favour of your country’s sovereignty and national independence.

It is outstanding the firm internationalist stand of the CPI(M) in favour of the just causes of the peoples of the world, who struggle to defend their sacred interests in the face of the policies of power, plunder and colonial and neocolonial domination imposed by imperialism and by oligarchic, corrupt and client governments subjected to the dictates of those who have brought more insecurity to the world.

Our people and our revolution will never forget the exemplary, steadfast and true solidarity of the communists and brotherly people of India who especially at the most difficult moments of our history, when the USSR and the Eastern European socialist countries had just collapsed and we were facing a double blockade that forced us to adopt the so-called Special Period, extended their friendly hand to us and collected funds, rupee by rupee, to send us tens of tons of rice, soap and other necessary items we lacked of.

Beautiful have also been the epic days of popular mobilisation throughout India against the US blockade and the US government’s aggressive policy against Cuba, including highlights such as the organisation of the Asia-Pacific meetings of solidarity with Cuba in Kolkata and the major steps taken in this sense early last year at the World Social Forum held in Mumbai.

Your Party is holding this important and far reaching meeting in the midst of a "particularly complex and dangerous" international situation because, after beginning his second term in office and in spite of the increasing international rejection towards his policy of warmongering and infinite cruelty in Iraq and his swamping and discredit in that country, President Bush has held his aggressive, militaristic, interventionist, expansionist and fascist course based on the so-called National Security Doctrine of "limited sovereignty", "humanitarian intervention" and "pre-emptive war", in his proclaimed aim to eliminate those they consider to be redoubts of tyrannies which, of course, are sovereign governments that do not subject themselves to imperial dictates.

In the case of Cuba, the US administration persists in destroying the Cuban revolution and our people’s achievements. It tries to make us surrender through hunger and disease and, in order to attain this aim, it reinforces its aggressive escalation and the blockade maintained for more than 45 years, thus turning into an official policy its criminal purpose of re-colonising and annexing our country by announcing its dark scheme of imposing a so-called "Independent Cuba", an aim that, of course, it will never achieve in the fact of the unyielding determination of our people and of our revolutionary leadership, who are resolved to die before returning to the infamous past and giving up our solidarity and internationalist principles.

In its vile purpose of trying to sweep away the example of encouragement and hope that the Cuban revolution symbolizes for the oppressed peoples of the world and in spite of the failure of its criminal policy implemented against Cuba for more than four decades, the arrogant Empire intensifies its economic war, continues to organise plans for our leaders’ assassination and military intervention, promotes campaigns of slanders and disinformation, and gives shelter to terrorist actions, while there are five courageous young Cuban patriots who are now imprisoned in US jails for combating that scourge.

In different places of the world, true champions of justice, organised in 242 committees to free the Cuban five heroes in 80 countries, demand the release of these prisoners of the empire who with their acts, tried to avoid the perpetration of terrorist actions against our homeland and against the US people themselves. Right here, in India, the noble banners in defense of such a just and universal cause are raised aloft.

Cuba continues attaining major economic, political and social achievements. It has particularly succeeded in obtaining outstanding results in education, health, culture, science, social security and sports, fields where we have carried out deep transformations although ours are the best results in all Latin America. At the same time, we are improving socialism in our effort to achieve a high level of social justice, without exclusions, with equal opportunities for all, by placing human beings at the center of society as part of the battle of ideas that prepares them, from the cultural, political and ideological point of view, to defend the immense work that we are building and to face the challenges lying ahead in the future of the world, a future that we are contributing to improve with 23,897 doctors and healthcare workers who are nowadays working in 69 countries with the implementation of the new and practical "Cuban Method" for a literacy campaign that is being carried out with very encouraging results in several countries of Latin America, Africa and Asia, as well as with the presence in our homeland of 17,944 foreign students from 113 countries, 15,944 of them have been granted scholarships, and 42,734 young people from 123 countries, especially from the Third World, have graduated in our country in the course of 42 years.

There is no doubt that the present economically and politically globalised world order is more insecure, irrational, unjust, unsustainable and intolerable. While a small minority lives in opulence, 1.2 billion people barely live in extreme poverty, 860 million adults are illiterate 40 million people are infected with AIDS or are dying because of this disease, and 11 million children under 5 years die every year because of preventable diseases.

On the other hand, the income gap between the richest and the poorest countries widens: in 1960 it was 37 times and now it is 74 times, while the plunder of the natural resources of the latter ones continues with the annual flight of 90% of their resources due to the unjust existing order. In the case of Latin America only, its foreign debt amounted to 350 billion dollars till the year 2004, it has almost doubled and amounts to 820 billion dollars.

While the defeat of neoliberalism is becoming increasingly evident and the recessive crisis of the world economy worsens, the peoples of the world fed up with so many ignominies, react and begin to rebel, gain momentum and become aware of the need to change the mercilessly imposed social order. At present, the Bolivarian Revolution and the national-democratic processes in Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina are good examples of this popular reaction in our continent.

In order to face such huge challenges, today it is more vital than ever the need to strengthen the unity of action of the revolutionary, democratic, anti-imperialist and patriotic forces of the world for building a better world.

We wish you a lot of success in implementing the agreements adopted by this Congress. Likewise, we would like to reiterate our solidarity and our Party’s will to further strengthen the excellent relations existing between our two organizations, while assuring you that the Cuban Communists and revolutionaries will remain loyal to our heritage of revolutionary and patriotic traditions and that we shall defend our revolution and socialism to the last consequences of our lives.