Solidarity Conference in Cuba

Zachary Berman, Interchange Managing Editor and FRD Cuba Program Officer, visited Cuba for the first time for the Solidarity Conference.

The second world meeting of friendship and solidarity with Cuba was held November 10-14 in Havana. In attendance were approximately 4500 people from 118 countries, including 600 from the US. Featured Cuban speakers included Carlos Lage, Vice President of the Council of State, Ricardo Alarcon, presiding officer of the National Assembly of People’s Power, Felipe Perez Roque, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and an unannounced final address by Fidel Castro. In addition, delegates from many nations spoke, mostly expressing their solidarity with the goals and the methods of the Cuban government, and to speak out against the embargo imposed by the United States.

The Karl Marx theater in Havana was filled for five days with flags and banners representing nations of all five continents, and the room echoed with applause at revolutionary slogans between simultaneous translation of all remarks into Spanish. Representatives thanked the Cuban government, emphasizing its generosity in sending doctors where needed in the third world as well as training doctors at the Latin American School of Medicine to return to their homes in Africa and Latin America. Speakers decried the misinformation campaigns of the US government, saying that in fact the Cuban system is more democratic than that of the US, because more of the population vote, and voting for representatives is not marred by high finance campaigns. In light of the fact that as of the conference the presidential election was entrenched in controversy, few bypassed the chance to criticize the American electoral system.

“Toda la Tierra Debía Ser un Gran Abrazo” (All the World Should Be a Huge Embrace). This quote from José Martí, martyr from the war of independence of Cuba from Spain, covered the banner behind the stage, and was referenced countless times. Friendship, solidarity, and embraces mingled with “Viva la Revolucion!” and “Patria o Muerte!” (Homeland or Death).

The first Conference was held in 1994, during the Special Period of Cuban history. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, Cuba, which had grown dependent on trade (especially sugar for oil) with the USSR suffered great economic distress. The tone of this second conference was optimistic since the Cuban economy is much improved in six years, defensive that the dual economy that brought an influx of wealth has distributed that wealth unevenly, and bitter toward the US trade embargo and at the economic disadvantage in which it has put Cuba.

While economics inevitably affect a nation and its people, they are only one indicator. Castro compared the cost of living of a typical US citizen to a Cuban, making an effort to keep clear that no matter how many factors one takes into account in an economic analysis, certain aspects, such as pride, cannot be charted. Many of the representatives to this conference, it seemed, were