Register for the Zoom meeting here: http://tinyurl.com/CubaResists
Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/254901752450010
Our battle is not only a battle for survival, to survive for the sake of surviving, no; it is a battle to participate in the fight for a better world, to participate in that fight together with the world.’ Fidel Castro, 24 August 1998.
Four days before the US presidential elections, we discuss the difficulties facing the Cuban people, with the global Covid-19 pandemic and the tightening of the US blockade, and how the Revolution continues to resist. In 2019 alone, the Trump administration introduced 86 new sanctions against Cuba; to starve the country of revenue, scare off foreign partners, create scarcity, and obstruct oil shipments from Venezuela. The US blockade cost Cuba $4 billion last year. The Trump administration has increased attacks on Cuba to secure victory in the key-state of Florida.
The Cuban economy has suffered the loss of revenues from medical services exports, the decrease in US tourism in 2019, the freeze in international tourism due to the Covid-19 lockdown and the fall in remittances. US sanctions create shortages of medicines, and prevent Cuba from purchasing, or receiving donations of medical equipment to treat Covid-19 patients. The US administration claims Cuban medical internationalists serving populations overseas are ‘slaves’, meanwhile 4,000 Cuban specialists treat Covid-19 patients in nearly 40 countries, saving lives.
Speakers include:
- Cuban Ambassador to Britain, Bárbara Montalvo Álvarez
- Cuban Ambassador to the US, Jose Ramon Cabañas
- Gloria La Riva, Presidential candidate for Party for Socialism and Liberation, US
- Valia Rodriguez, Cuban physician
- Helen Yaffe, University of Glasgow
- A speaker from the Rock Around the Blockade campaign
The speakers will discuss the impact of the US blockade on people in Cuba and worldwide, and how revolutionary Cuba continues to resist imperialist aggression and inspire the world.