[1592] in peace2
[Fidel's Speech at Monterrey]
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Laura Doughty)
Tue Mar 26 11:37:12 2002
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2002 11:34:44 -0500
Message-Id: <200203261634.g2QGYir14624@mgm.mit.edu>
From: Laura Doughty <laura@mgm.mit.edu>
To: peace-announce@MIT.EDU
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Subject: Re: Fidel's Speech at Monterrey
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2002 16:13:41
Some heads of states in Monterrey issued protests of a sort of the
situation faced by Third World countries, "But fiercest of all was
Fidel Castro of Cuba," the New York Times reported, "dressed in
battle fatigues, whose short but scathing critique of the world
powers assembled before him led the American contingent to walk out
of the closed conference hall."
Speech by Fidel Castro, president of the Republic of Cuba, at the
International Conference on Financing for Development. Monterrey,
March 21, 2002
Excellencies:
Not everyone here will share my thoughts. Still, I will respectfully
say what I think. The existing world economic order constitutes a
system of plundering and exploitation like no other in history. Thus,
the peoples believe less and less in statements and promises. The
prestige of the international financial institutions rates less than
zero. The world economy is today a huge casino.Recent analyses
indicate that for every dollar that goes into trade, over one hundred
end up in speculative operations completely disconnected from the
real economy. As a result of this economic order, over 75 percent of
the world population lives in underdevelopment, and extreme poverty
has already reached 1.2 billion people in the Third World. So, far
from narrowing, the gap is widening. The revenue of the richest
nations, that in 1960 was 37 times larger than that of the poorest,
is now 74 times larger. The situation has reached such extremes that
the assets of the three wealthiest persons in the world amount to the
GDP of the 48 poorest countries combined. The number of people
actually starving was 826 million in the year 2001. There are at the
moment 854 million illiterate adults while 325 million children do
not attend school. There are 2 billion people who have no access to
low cost medications and 2.4 billion lack basic sanitation
conditions. No less than 11 million children under the age of 5
perish every year from preventable causes while half a million go
blind for lack of vitamin A. The life span of the population in the
developed world is 30 years higher than that of people living in
Sub-Saharan Africa. A true genocide!
The poor countries should not be blamed for this tragedy. They
neither conquered nor plundered entire continents for centuries; they
did not establish colonialism, or re-establish slavery; and, modern
imperialism is not of their making. Actually, they have been its
victims. Therefore, the main responsibility for financing their
development lies with those states that, for obvious historical
reasons, enjoy today the benefits of those atrocities. The rich world
should condone their foreign debt and grant them fresh soft credits
to finance their development. The traditional offers of assistance,
always scant and often ridiculous, are either inadequate or
unfulfilled. For a true and sustainable economic and social
development to take place much more is required than is usually
admitted. Measures as those suggested by the late James Tobin to
curtail the irrepressible flow of currency speculation-albeit it was
not his idea to foster development-would perhaps be the only ones
capable of generating enough funds, which in the hands of the UN
agencies and not of awful institutions like the IMF, could supply
direct development assistance with a democratic participation of all
countries and without the need to sacrifice the independence and
sovereignty of the peoples.
The Consensus draft, which the masters of the world are imposing on
this conference, intends that we accept humiliating, conditioned and
interfering alms. Everything created since Bretton Woods until today
should be reconsidered. A farsighted vision was then missing, thus,
the privileges and interests of the most powerful prevailed. In the
face of the deep present crisis, a still worse future is offered
where the economic, social and ecological tragedy of an increasingly
ungovernable world would never be resolved and where the number of the
poor and the starving would grow higher, as if a large part of
humanity were doomed. It is high time for statesmen and politicians
to calmly reflect on this. The belief that a social and economic
order that has proven to be unsustainable can be forcibly imposed is
really senseless. As I have said before, the ever more sophisticated
weapons piling up in the arsenals of the wealthiest and the mightiest
can kill the illiterate, the ill, the poor and the hungry but they
cannot kill ignorance, illnesses, poverty or hunger. It should
definitely be said:"Farewell to arms."
Something must be done to save Humanity!
A better world is possible!
Thank you.
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