OBAMA HAS NO EASY TASK | Reflections by Comrade Fidel

I remember that, when I visited the People’s Republic of Poland, during Gierek’s government, I was taken to Osviecim, the most notorious of all concentration camps. There I learned about the horrible crimes committed by the Nazis against Jewish children, women and senior citizens, which resulted from the implementation of the ideas contained in the book Mein Kampf written by Adolph Hitler. Those ideas had been implemented before at the time when the territory of the USSR was invaded in the quest for vital space. By that time, the governments of London and Paris incited the Nazi chief against the Soviet State.

The Soviet army liberated the prisoners kept at Osviecim and those of almost all the Nazi concentration camps, condemned those events and took pictures and films which traveled around world.

Obama spoke at the Buchenwald concentration camp, within the German territory. A granduncle of his, who is still alive and was accompanying him at the rally, had helped to release the prisoners of that camp.

The most important activity he carried out in Europe was his attendance to the celebration of the 65^th anniversary of the Normandy landing, where he pronounced a second speech. He went out of his way to praise Dwight Eisenhower, who commanded the landing. He recognized, in all fairness, the courage of the American soldiers who fought down a few kilometers of coastline, with the support of the US and the British navy and of thousands of planes that came mostly from the US factories. The paratroopers divisions were not dropped at the most correct positions and therefore the battle extended unnecessarily.

The bulk of Hitler’s army and its elite divisions had been annihilated by Soviet soldiers at the Russian front, after they recovered from the damages caused by the first military attack. The resistance put up by the city of Leningrad to a prolonged siege, the combats waged by the Siberian divisions a few kilometers away from Moscow, and the battles of Stalingrad and of the Kursk salient will go down in the history of wars as some of the most significant and decisive events.

Obama, who spoke at the celebration of the 65^th anniversary of the Normandy landing, thanks to which, as can be inferred from his speech, Europe was liberated, dedicated only 15 words to speak about the role played by the USSR --hardly 1.2 words per every 2 million Soviet citizens who died in that war. That was not fair.

After the end of that bloody war, Iran, which played a significant role in that war given its natural resources and its geographical position, was turned by the United States into its strongest and better armed gendarme in that strategic Asian region.

The Iranian people, led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, with the masses unarmed and ready to make any sacrifice, overthrew the powerful Shah of Iran. That happened during the last two years of the government of Jimmy Carter, who suffered the first consequences of the wrong foreign policy of the United States. That policy shortened his mandate and facilitated Ronald Reagan’s coming to power.

The Shah died on July 27, 1980, in Cairo, the same city where Obama delivered his speech on June 4 last.

The absurd war between Iraq and Iran which began in 1980 lasted 8 years and was not caused by Khomeini. Reagan got as much as he could out of it. He first sold weapons to Iran. With those weapons and the revenues from drug trafficking he funded the dirty war against Nicaragua, thus evading the decisions adopted by the Congress whereby it refused to grant funds for that cruel adventure that took the life of so many ‘Sandinista’ youths. Reagan supported Iraq’s war against Iran.

The US government authorized the supply of raw materials, technology and gases for the chemical war against Iran, which killed tens of thousands of soldiers of that country; the civil population was severely affected. American companies collaborated in the manufacturing of chemical weapons. Besides, satellites provided the necessary information for all land operations; 600 000 Iranians and 400 000 Iraqis died in that war; hundreds of billions of dollars were spent by those two major oil producing countries before both parties accepted the peace project drafted by the United Nations.

It is not an easy task for a US President to deliver a speech at the Muslim University of Al-Azhar of Cairo. Nor is it to be expected that the Iranians and the Arabs would feel very enthusiastic about said speech.

Fidel Castro Ruz
June 14, 2009
4:36 p.m.

Humboldt and Gauss in the Streets of Havana

The German Culture Festival brought Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) once again to the streets of Havana, this time accompanied by his compatriot Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777–1855), known as the Prince of Math, one of the men who anticipated the course of non-Euclidian Geometry.

GERMAN NOVELIST Daniel Kehlmann.

The two learned men came hand in hand with the novel La medición del mundo (Measuring the World), a book that has become one of the most internationally resounding successes from that European country’s field of letters in this first decade of the new millennium. It was presented at the house named after the German naturalist, located in Old Havana’s historical area.

The novel, taking a meeting between Humboldt and Gauss, recreates the parallel lives of these men who lived in the same epoch, but the author takes good care not to offer a biographical version.

La medición del mundo, on the contrary, goes for the delusions and certainties of their intellectual and human concerns, for the nobility and misfortunes of the two men, and has an imaginative literary construction that takes the novelist close to the resources of Latin American magic realism.

It’s an enjoyable narration that includes, besides the main characters, others like a declining Emmanuel Kant, a Daguerre that nervously wants to capture a blurred picture, and a heretical and hedonistic Bompland, very different from the pale image usually given of Humboldt’s American adventure companion.

Daniel Kehlmann (Munich, 1975) studied philosophy and literature and lives in Vienna. His first novel was published when he was 22 years old. But it was Yo y Kaminski (Kaminski and I), published in 2003, that won him both the favor of critics and the public for the first time. His novel Ich und Kaminski (Yo y Kaminski, Barcelona, 2005), from 2003, gave him world fame. With La medición del mundo (2005) he has experienced the great leap forward.

"I wanted to write like a crazy historian", he said when asked what was true and what wasn’t in a story that, although it’s a tribute to memory and intelligence, contradicts the rigorous Cartesian codes of European rationalism.

The author has won the Kleist Prize, one of the most illustrious German awards, and was a finalist in the Deutscher Buchpreis (German Book Prize / PEDRO DE LA HOZ).

Children Demand an End to Child Labor at UN Headquarters

GENEVA, June 12.— More than 600 children gathered in front of the UN headquarters in Geneva on the World Day against Child Labor to demand an end to this illegal practice, EFE reported.

The children entered the UN building to attend the plenary session of the International Labor Organization (ILO), "on behalf of all the children of the world."

This event is the last of a long list of activities organized in this city to promote awareness among citizens, with a focus on children, regarding child labor.

The ILO dedicated its conference to the World Day against Child Labor, especially to girls.

This organization estimates that some 100 million girls are victims of child labor in the world.

Lazo Calls for Rational Use of Resources During the Summer

Politburo member Esteban Lazo Hernández said that organizations should offer the Cuban people, especially the youth, a summer vacation plenty of leisure, cultural and sports activities, but making better use of resources, savings and with austerity.

Lazo, who is also Vice President of the Council of State, presided over a meeting with representatives of the Young Communist League (UJC), student and grassroots organizations, as well as heads of ministries and institutions involved in the summer recreational programs.

Lazo noted the importance of prioritizing the help to those damaged by the hurricanes that hit the country last year, especially in those areas where schools and houses have not been repaired.

He said that the facilities devoted to cultural and youth activities in each municipality and people’s council, should host multiple activities. Here’s where the most important event are to take place.

Although this summer finds Cuba at a complex juncture economically speaking, he said that it coincides with the vacation of students and workers, and therefore, all the facilities, movie theaters, social clubs, TV and radio shows, should increase their offers to the public, but they should also continue to save resources and meet the electricity plan.

Julio Martínez, UJC first secretary, presented the initial program, which calls for integration and creativity, and will be devoted to the 50^th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution. (AIN / Alina Martínez)

Chávez Denounces Separatist Plans in Venezuela

CARACAS, June 14.–– President Hugo Chávez warned today that the Venezuelan oligarchy is making efforts to revive separatist plans in the southwestern states of Zulia and Táchira, PL news agency reported.

"We are not going to allow them to turn Táchira, or Zulia, into a lair for paramilitary soldiers," said Chávez during the Aló, Presidente program, which was broadcasted from the La Bandera Primary Unit of Social Property, in Táchira.

Chávez also called on the governors to fulfill their duties and mentioned that the people, the Armed Forces and the Constitution would combat the separatist plans. He also denounced a campaign of certain mass media against the Bolivarian Armed Forces, in an attempt to divide it.

Chávez also said that more than a million Venezuelan youths had enrolled the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) after a process that began on May 8 and will end on Sunday.

JOINT ANSWER TO THE CRISIS

CARACAS, June 14.–– Venezuelan President, Hugo Chávez, said today that the current world crisis demands rigor, attention, knowledge, efforts and the joint search of solutions.

In his Sunday column Las Líneas the Chávez (Chávez´Lines), the president spoke of the recently concluded Petrocaribe Summit, held last Friday in Saint Kitts and Nevis, with the attendance of 18 heads of state and government.

About Petrocaribe he said that, "It is one of the new bases for integration, which will allow for building a modern system of economic relations in Latin America, and at the same time, it will raise the banners of Caribbean dignity and freedom higher and higher."