[KS] Castro on Corea; Cuba and the Koreas. (Just for a change from rocks and God.)
Afostercarter at aol.com
Afostercarter at aol.com
Sun Aug 3 05:01:18 EDT 2008
Castro on Corea; Cuba and the Koreas
Fidel Castro, who has opinions on most things and the time and space to air
them, has lately been holding forth about Korea; see below. (Thanks to the
Financial Times for the tip.)
Howlers and imprecisions would fail this as an undergraduate essay; his
first 8 sentences are each false, or questionable. The tendentiousness too is
depressing, if unsurprising. (Note the lazy relapse into culturalism to ‘explain’
South Korean development, rather than junking the crudely static theories
of imperialism according to which this just shouldn’t happen.)
Yet Fidel is Fidel, so this has to be of interest; eg the criticism of North
Korea’s nuclear test – but of nothing else about the DPRK, or its leaders –
and his saying: “With South Korea, we are developing more and more ties.”
(Cuba and Syria are the only two major nations that still do not officially
recognize the ROK, along with Macedonia (?) and Monaco (!))
On Cuba’s growing links to Seoul, the articles and pictures below offer
further illustrations and food for thought. I commented on Hyundai’s power
stations at the time in Asia Times, as excerpted below:
_http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/HI06Dg01.html_ (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/HI06Dg01.html)
Moreover, at this very moment the Cuban baseball team is training for the
Beijing Olympics in Korea – South Korea, that is – complete with Fidel’s son
Antonio as their physician.
_http://www.expat-advisory.com/south-korea/seoul/cuban-baseball-players-in-seo
ul.php_
(http://www.expat-advisory.com/south-korea/seoul/cuban-baseball-players-in-seoul.php)
In his latest flourish, hot off the press today (August 1), Antonio’s papa
refers (tactfully) to:
“The proud Cuban athletes of the Olympic baseball team, who have been
wonderfully taken care of by their Korean hosts and will be even better taken care
of in China…”
_http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/agosto/vier1/32reflexiones.html_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/agosto/vier1/32reflexiones.html)
Good old Granma, where you can read the thoughts of chairman Castro on every
subject under the sun – including on Japan, China and more – these days
also carries ads for South Korean cars (Kia and Ssangyong) on the same page. O
tempora… _http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/reflections-fidel-castro.html_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/reflections-fidel-castro.html)
Happy summers to one and all,
Aidan
1 August 2008
AIDAN FOSTER-CARTER
Honorary Senior Research Fellow in Sociology & Modern Korea, Leeds
University
New home address: Flat 1, 40 Magdalen Road, Exeter, EX2 4TE, UK
Yorkshire address: 17 Birklands Road, Shipley, West Yorkshire, BD18 3BY, UK
Telephone (please use mobile in the first instance): +44(0) 7970 741307
Exeter: +44 (0) 1392 257753 Shipley:
+44(0) 1274 588586
[NB old fax and ISDN numbers will be changing; tba]
Email: _afostercarter at aol.com_ (mailto:afostercarter at aol.com) (alt)
_afostercarter at yahoo.com_ (mailto:afostercarter at yahoo.com) website:
_www.aidanfc.net_ (http://www.aidanfc.net/)
[Please use @aol; but if any problems, please try @yahoo too – and let me
know, so I can chide AOL]
__________________________
_http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200608/200608140022.html_
(http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200608/200608140022.html)
Updated Aug.14,2006 22:07 KST
Fidel Hails Revolutionary Korean Efficiency
The ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro had high praise for Koreans in a
meeting with staffers from Hyundai Heavy Industries, who are building packaged
power stations in the Caribbean nation, the company said Monday.
Right before falling ill with intestinal bleeding, Castro and a group of
aides made a surprise visit to the construction site on July 11. The elderly
revolutionary was dressed in military uniform and limped a little, witnesses
said. After looking around the site, he told Korean workers it was extraordinary
that such a small number of workers can build a power station. A mere 11
Korean workers are involved in the construction. The Cuban leader was quoted as
urging his people to learn from the diligence and aggressive working style of
Koreans.
Cuban leader Fidel Castro makes a visit to the construction site of power
stations built by
Korea¡¯s Hyundai Heavy Industries. /Yonhap
In May, Castro met with management of the Korean company to sign the
contract for the station. At the time, he said Koreans were even more reliable than
Japanese people since they work fast and push toward the goal. Hyundai Heavy
Industries quoted Castro as saying South Koreans were also ¡°better than
North Koreans and Chinese.¡±
Hyundai Heavy Industries won the US$720 million contract to produce and
install 544 packaged power facilities across the nation. Once completed by the
end of next year, they will likely supply one-third of the total power
generation in Cuba, the company said. Castro underwent surgery to halt internal
bleeding after temporarily handing over power to his younger brother Raul late
last month but is reportedly recovering.
(englishnews at chosun.com )
__________________________
_http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200701/200701300030.html_
(http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200701/200701300030.html)
Updated Jan.30,2007 10:30 KST
Korean-Made Power Generators Appear on Cuban Banknotes
A power generator built by a Korean company appears on new 10-peso banknotes
issued by the Central Bank of Cuba from the start of this year. After
winning a bid in 2005, Hyundai Heavy Industries has been installing 544 package
power stations, or PPS systems, in 41 areas around Cuba. A ceremony to mark the
completion of the first installation is scheduled take place at the end of
this month in the capital Havana.
The newly-designed bills feature an engraving of the container-sized
generators, along with a Spanish slogan that translates to "energy revolution," on
the reverse side of the widely-circulated 10-peso notes.
Suffering from chronic power shortages, Cuba is putting a significant effort
into developing its energy industry. The country's president Fidel Castro
last year personally inspected the installation site of one of Hyundai's PPS
facilities.
(englishnews at chosun.com )
>From Aidan Foster-Carter, “Seoul cleans up in Africa”, Asia Times Online,
Sep 6, 2006
_http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/HI06Dg01.html_
(http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/HI06Dg01.html)
….
If South Korea is in no rush to bag these last two scalps, that's because
its commerce, if not its diplomats, is far from unwelcome in Damascus and
Havana.
For example, last year Cuba wanted to build a network of small local power
stations. That's a North Korean specialty, at least as Pyongyang tells it. It
was prowess in this area that brought ex-premier Yon Hyong-muk back from
quasi-exile running Jagang province to be vice chairman and senior civilian on
the National Defense Commission - the top executive body, outranking the cabinet
- before his untimely demise last October.
So Fidel Castro called in the Koreans. Er, the other Koreans. The $720
million contract went to Hyundai Heavy Industries, who set to work installing no
fewer than 544 packaged power facilities - with just 11 workers. (I'll bet the
North Korean version, by contrast, needs hundreds of scrawny peasants with
shovels, and is grossly inefficient - if indeed it works at all.)
Thus it was that the right-wing Seoul daily Chosun Ilbo marked Liberation
Day on August 15 with one of its unlikelier headlines: "Fidel hails
revolutionary Korean efficiency". A month earlier, on July 11 (but only now revealed),
the Cuban leader paid a surprise visit to Hyundai's site. He was impressed
that so few workers are needed for a project that, when completed by end-2007,
will supply one-third of Cuba's electricity needs, and was quoted as urging
Cubans to learn from the Koreans' "diligence and aggressive working style".
For good measure he had a photo taken with them, Kim Jong-il style. Two
months earlier, signing the contract, Fidel (according to Hyundai) said South
Koreans were not only "better than North Koreans and Chinese" but even more
reliable than Japanese, because they work fast toward a goal. That won't have
made pleasant holiday reading for the Dear Leader.
But hang on. It was just after visiting Hyundai that Castro came down with
the mysterious intestinal bleeding that has sidelined him for the past few
weeks. Among all the various medical and conspiracy theories flying around,
might it have been something in the kimchi?
_http://www.expat-advisory.com/south-korea/seoul/cuban-baseball-players-in-seo
ul.php_
(http://www.expat-advisory.com/south-korea/seoul/cuban-baseball-players-in-seoul.php)
Cuban baseball players in Seoul
Cuba's national baseball team arrived Tuesday in Korea to train here ahead
of the the Summer Games in Beijing, accompanied by the high-profile son of
former Cuban President Fidel Castro, an official was quoted as saying by Yonhap
News Agency.
The baseball powerhouse that won three Olympic gold medals from 1992-2004 is
one of a host of Olympic teams that have come here after being lured by
Korea's environmental conditions, which are better than those of Beijing.
Antonio Castro, the 39-year-old son of the retired Cuban president,
accompanied the team as a physician but declined to give an interview to journalists
at Incheon International Airport. Castro also serves as a vice head of Cuba's
baseball governing body.
The 44-member team will train in environmentally pristine southern Korea and
leave for China just a day before the Beijing Olympics begin on August 8,
Park Geun-chan of the Korean Baseball Organization said by phone.
During its training here, the team hopes to play friendlies with local
professional squads, Cuban coach Antonio Pacheco told Korean reporters at the
airport.
July 16, 2008
_http://app.yonhapnews.co.kr/yna/basic/ArticleEnglish/ArticlePhoto/YIBW_showAr
ticlePhotoPopup.aspx?contents_id=PYH20080320002100341_
(http://app.yonhapnews.co.kr/yna/basic/ArticleEnglish/ArticlePhoto/YIBW_showArticlePhotoPopup.aspx?co
ntents_id=PYH20080320002100341)
S. Korea, Cuba hold economic talks
March 19, MEXICO CITY, Mexico -- Visiting officials from South Korea's Korea
Export Insurance Corporation, including its head Cho Hwan-eik, holds talks
with ranking Cuban officials about purchases of Korean products in Cuba on
March 18. It was the first time in 49 years that the South Korean and Cuban
flags were displayed together. The nations have no diplomatic ties. (Yonhap)
_http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/juev24/Reflections-22julio.html_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/juev24/Reflections-22julio.html)
C U B A
Havana. July 22, 2008
Reflections of Fidel
The two Koreas
PART I
Translated by ESTI
THE Korean nation, with its unique culture that differentiates it from its
Chinese and Japanese neighbors, has existed for three thousand years. These
characteristics are typical of societies in that Asian region, including those
of China, Vietnam and others. There is nothing like it in Western cultures,
some of which are less than 250 years old.
In the war of 1894, the Japanese had seized from China its control over the
Korean dynasty and turned its territory into a Japanese colony. Protestantism
was introduced into this country in the year 1892, following an agreement
between the United States and the Korean authorities. On the other hand,
Catholicism was introduced in the same century by missionaries. It is estimated
that today in South Korea, around 25 percent of the population is Christian and
a similar percentage is Buddhist. The philosophy of Confucius had a great
influence on the spirit of Koreans, who are not characterized by fanatical
religious practices.
Two important figures stand out in that nation’s political life in the 20th
century: Syngman Rhee, born in March of 1875, and Kim Il Sung, born 37 years
later in April of 1912. Both personalities, of different social background,
confronted each other due to historical circumstances that had nothing to do
with either of them.
The Christians opposed the Japanese colonial system. One of them was Syngman
Rhee, who was an actively practicing Protestant. Korea changed its status:
Japan annexed its territory in 1910. Years later, in 1919, Rhee was appointed
president of the provisional government in exile, headquartered in Shanghai,
China. He never used weapons against the invaders. The League of Nations in
Geneva paid no attention to him.
The Japanese Empire was brutally repressive with the Korean population. The
patriots took up arms against the Japanese colonialist policy and succeeded
in liberating a small area in the mountain region of the north at the end of
the 1890’s.
Kin Il Sung, born in the vicinity of Pyongyang, joined the Korean Communist
guerrillas to fight the Japanese at the age of 18. In his active
revolutionary life, he attained the position of political and military leader of the
anti-Japanese combatants in North Korea, at the young age of 33.
During World War II, the United States decided the fate of Korea in the
post-war period. It joined the conflict when it was attacked by one of its own
creatures, the Empire of the Rising Sun, whose tight feudal gates were opened
by Commodore Perry in the first half of the 19th century, aiming his cannons
at the strange Asian country that refused to trade with America.
The outstanding disciple later became a powerful rival, as I have already
explained on another occasion. Decades later, Japan successively struck at
China and Russia, additionally taking over Korea. Nevertheless it was an astute
ally for the victors of World War I, at the expense of China. It amassed
forces and, transformed into the Asian version of fascist Nazism, attempted to
occupy Chinese territory in 1937 and attacked the United States in December of
1941; it brought the war to Southeast Asia and Oceania.
The colonial domains of Britain, France, Holland and Portugal in the region
were doomed and the United States emerged as the most powerful country in the
world, matched only by the Soviet Union then destroyed by World War II and
by the heavy material and human losses resulting from the Nazi attack. The
Chinese Revolution was about to conclude in 1945 when the world massacre ceased.
The united anti-Japanese combat was taking up its energy then. Mao, Ho Chi
Minh, Gandhi, Sukarno and other leaders later carried on the fight against the
restoration of the old world order which was already unsustainable. Truman
dropped the nuclear bomb on two civilian Japanese cities; this was a
terribly destructive new weapon whose existence they had not reported to their
Soviet ally, as has been explained, one which had been the major contributor to
the destruction of fascism. Nothing justified the genocide committed, not even
the fact that the tenacious Japanese resistance had taken the lives of almost
15,000 American soldiers on the Japanese island of Okinawa. Japan was
already defeated, and that weapon, had it been dropped on a military target, would
have sooner or later had the same demoralizing effect on the Japanese
military machine without any more casualties among U.S. soldiers. It was an act of
indescribable terror.
Soviet soldiers were advancing on Manchuria and North Korea, just as they
had promised when fighting ceased in Europe. The allies had defined beforehand
the point each army could reach. The dividing line would be in the middle of
Korea, equidistant between the Yalu River and the southern end of the
peninsula. The U.S. government negotiated with the Japanese the rules that would
govern the surrendering of troops on their own territory. Japan would be
occupied by the United States. In Korea, annexed to Japan, a large force of the
powerful Japanese army would remain. South of the 38th Parallel, the established
dividing line, U.S. interests prevailed. Syngman Rhee, reincorporated into
that part of the territory by the U.S. government, was the leader the Americans
supported, with the open cooperation of the Japanese. That is how he won the
hard-fought election of 1948. That year, the soldiers of the Soviet Army
had pulled out of North Korea.
On June 25, 1950 war broke out in the country. It is still unclear who fired
the first shot, whether it was the combatants in the North or the American
soldiers on duty with soldiers recruited by Rhee. The argument does not make
any sense if one analyzes it from the Korean angle. Kim Il Sung’s soldiers
fought against the Japanese for the liberation of all Korea. His armies advanced
irrepressibly to the far reaches to the South where the Yankees were
defending themselves with the massive back-up of their fighter planes. Seoul and
other cities had been occupied. MacArthur, commander-in-chief of U.S. forces in
the Pacific, decided to order a Marine landing at Incheon, at the rearguard
of Northern forces which by then were in no condition to counterattack.
Pyongyang fell into the hands of Yankee forces, preceded by devastating air
strikes. That fostered the idea of the U.S. military command in the Pacific to
occupy all of Korea, since the Peoples’ Liberation Army of China, lead by Mao
Zedong had inflicted a resounding defeat on the pro-Yankee forces of Chiang
Kai-shek, supplied and supported by the United States. The entire continental and
maritime territory of that great country had been recovered, with the
exception of Taipei and other small near-by islands where Kuomintang forces found
refuge after being transported there by vessels of the Sixth Fleet.
The history of what happened then is well known today. It should not be
forgotten that Boris Yeltsin handed over to Washington the Soviet Union archives,
among other things.
What did the United States do when the virtually inevitable conflict broke
out under the premises created in Korea? It portrayed the northern part of
that country as the aggressor. The Security Council of the recently created
United Nations Organization, promoted by the victorious powers of W. W. II,
passed a resolution that none of the five members could veto. Precisely in those
months, the USSR had expressed its disagreement with the exclusion of China
from the Security Council, where the United States was recognizing Chiang
Kai-Shek, with less than 0.3 percent of national territory and less than 2 percent
of the population, as a member of that Council and with a right to the veto.
Such arbitrariness led to the absence of the Russian delegate, with the
result that the Council agreed to give the war the character of a UN military
action against the alleged aggressor: the Peoples’ Republic of Korea. China,
completely outside the conflict, which was affecting its unfinished fight for
the total liberation of the country, saw the threat hovering directly against
its own territory, this being unacceptable for its security. According to
public information, Prime Minister Zhou Enlai was sent to Moscow to inform
Stalin of China’s point of view as to the inadmissibility of the presence of UN
forces under U.S. command on the banks of the Yalu River which marks Korea's
border with China, and to request Soviet cooperation. At the time there were no
profound contradictions between the two Socialist giants.
It has been affirmed that China’s response was planned for the October 13
and that Mao postponed it to the 19th, awaiting the Soviet reply. That was as
long as he could put it off.
I intend to finish this reflection next Friday. It is a complex and
laborious subject which requires special care and information that is as precise as
possible. These are historical events that should be known and remembered.
Fidel Castro Ruz
July 22, 2008.
9:22 p.m.
- _Reflections_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/reflections-fidel-castro.html) _o_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/reflections-of-president-fidel-castro.html) _F Fidel_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/reflections-fidel-castro.html)
_http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/sabado26/3reflexiones.html_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/sabado26/3reflexiones.html)
C U B A
Havana. July 26, 2008
REFLECTIONS OF FIDEL
The two Koreas
Part II
ON October 19, 1950, more than 400,000 voluntary Chinese combatants, on
orders from Mao Zedong, crossed the Yalu and waylaid the US troops that were
advancing towards the Chinese border. The US units, surprised by the vigorous
response of the country that they had underestimated, were forced to withdraw
toward a region near the southern coast, pushed back by the joint action of the
Chinese and North Korean forces. Stalin, who was immensely cautious, offered
far less support than Mao had anticipated, though the MiG-15 aircrafts
piloted by the Soviets over a limited 42.5-miles front, proved valuable help
during the initial stage of the conflict in protecting land forces during their
intrepid advance. Pyongyang was again recovered and Seoul re-occupied once
more, attempting to fight back the incessant onslaught of the US Air Force, the
most powerful that has ever existed.
McArthur was anxious to attack China with nuclear weapons. He called for
their use following the shameful defeat they had tasted. President Truman saw no
other choice but to dismiss him from his command and appoint General
Matthews Ridgeway head of US air, sea and land forces in the theater of operations.
Next to the United States, the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands,
Belgium, Luxembourg, Greece, Canada, Turkey, Ethiopia, South Africa, the
Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Colombia took part in the
imperialist adventure. Colombia, then under the unitary government of conservative
Laureano Gómez, who was responsible for the mass slaughter of peasants, was the
only Latin American country involved. As we said, the Ethiopia of Haile
Selassie, where slavery still existed, and a South Africa still under the
domination of white racists, also took part in the invasion.
It was barely five years since the world slaughter that began in September
1939 had come to an end on August 1945. Following bloody combat in Korean
territory, Parallel 38 once again became the border separating the North and
South. It is estimated that, in that war, about two million North Koreans, nearly
half a million or one million Chinese and more than one million allied
soldiers perished. Around 44 thousand US soldiers lost their lives. More than a
few of them had been born in Puerto Rico or other Latin American countries,
recruited to take part in a war they were driven to by their condition as poor
immigrants.
Japan was to reap many benefits from the conflict. In the space of one year,
industrial output grew by 50 % and, within two years, it again reached
pre-war production levels. What didn't change, however, was how the acts of
genocide committed by the imperial troops in Korea were perceived. The governments
of Japan have paid tribute to the acts of genocide carried out by their
soldiers, who, in China, had raped tens of thousands of women and brutally
murdered hundreds of thousands of people, as was explained in a reflection.
Hard-working and tenacious, the Japanese have transformed their country,
bereft of oil and other important raw materials, into the second most powerful
economy in the world.
Japan's GDP, measured in capitalist terms, though the data varies according
to different Western sources, is today over $4.5 trillion, and the country
has over one trillion in hard currency reserves. This is twice China’s GDP, of
$2.2 trillion, even though China has 50% more hard currency reserves than
Japan. The GDP of the United States, of $12.4 trillion, for a country with 34.6
times more territory and 2.3 times Japan’s population, is only three times
that of Japan. Its government is today one of imperialism's main allies, at a
time when it is threatened by economic recession and the sophisticated weapons
of the superpower put at risk the entire human species.
These are historical lessons which cannot be forgotten.
The war, however, took a considerable toll on China. Truman instructed the
6th Fleet to prevent the landing of Chinese revolutionary forces that would
result in the complete emancipation of their country by reclaiming the 0.3
percent of their territory that had been occupied by the rest of the pro-Yankee
forces of Chiang Kai-shek that had fled there.
Sino-Soviet relations were to deteriorate later, following the death of
Stalin, in March 1953. The revolutionary movement split nearly everywhere. The
dramatic call issued by Ho Chi Minh made evident the damage that had been done,
and imperialism, through its immense media apparatus, fuelled the fires of
extremism among false revolutionary theoreticians, an area in which US
intelligence agencies were to become experts.
With the arbitrary division, North Korea had been dealt the most mountainous
part of the country. Every grain of food had to be reaped through sweat and
sacrifice. Pyongyang, the capital, had been razed to the ground. Many people
who had been wounded or mutilated during the war were in need of medical
attention. They were enduring a blockade and had no resources available. The
Soviet Union and other countries of the socialist bloc were in the process of
recovering from the war.
When I arrived in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea on March 7,
1986, nearly 33 years following the destruction caused by the war, it was still
difficult to believe what had occurred there. That heroic people had
constructed myriad things: large and small dams and canals to store water in, generate
electricity, service cities and irrigate fields; thermoelectric plants,
large mechanical and other types of industries, many of them underground in the
depths of the bedrock, all created through hard, methodical labor. Because of
cooper and aluminum shortages, they had been forced to use iron to create
electricity-guzzling transmission lines, iron which, in part, was produced from
coal. The capital and other cities that had been devastated were
reconstructed, inch by inch. I estimated that millions of new homes had been built in
urban and rural areas and that tens of thousands of other kinds of facilities
had been set up. Countless hours of work were contained in stone, concrete,
steel, wood, synthetic products and machinery. The fields that I had the
opportunity to see, wherever I went, looked like gardens. Well-dressed, organized
and enthusiastic people were everywhere, ready to greet visitors. The country
deserved cooperation and peace.
There was no issue I didn't discuss with my illustrious host Kim Il Sung. I
shall never forget him.
Korea was divided into two parts by an imaginary line. The South was to have
a different experience. It was the more densely populated part and endured
less destruction during the war. The presence of an enormous foreign military
force required the supply of local manufactured goods and other products,
from crafts to fresh fruits and vegetables, not to mention services. The
military spending of the allies was huge. The same thing occurred when the United
States decided to retain extensive military forces in the country indefinitely.
During the Cold War, Western and Japanese transnationals invested
considerable sums of money, siphoning out incalculable wealth from the sweat of South
Koreans, a people who are as hard-working and industrious as their brothers
and sisters in the North. The great markets of the world were open to their
products. They were not blockaded. Today, the country has high levels of
technology and productivity. It has suffered the economic crises of the West,
following which many South Korean companies were taken over by transnationals. The
austere nature of its people has allowed the State to accumulate significant
reserves in hard currency. Today, it is enduring the United States' economic
depression, particularly the high prices of oil and food, and the
inflationary pressures from both.
South Korea's GDP –$787.6 billion– is almost equal to that of Brazil ($796
billion) and Mexico ($768 billion), countries with abundant hydrocarbon
reserves and incomparably larger populations. Imperialism imposed its system upon
these nations. Two fell behind; the other made much more progress.
There is hardly any emigration from South Korea to the West. There is
emigration en masse from Mexico to what is currently US territory. From Brazil,
South and Central America, people emigrate everywhere, in search of employment
and lured by consumerist propaganda. Today, they are being rewarded with
rigorous and contemptuous laws.
The principled position on nuclear weapons supported by Cuba within the
Non-Aligned Movement, ratified during the Summit Conference held in Havana in
August 2006, is well known.
I met the current leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Kim
Jong Il, when I arrived at the Pyongyang airport. He was standing discretely
beside his father, to one side of the red carpet. Cuba maintains excellent
relations with his government.
When the Soviet Union and the socialist bloc collapsed, the Democratic People
’s Republic of Korea lost important markets and sources of oil, raw
materials and equipment. As in Cuba’s case, the consequences were severe. The
progress that had been attained through great sacrifices was at risk. In spite of
this, they showed themselves capable of constructing a nuclear weapon.
When the nuclear test was conducted around a year ago, we conveyed to the
government of North Korea our points of view on the damage this could cause
poor Third World countries that were waging an unequal and difficult battle
against imperialist designs at a decisive moment for the world. It might not have
been necessary. Kim Song Il, at that point, had already decided beforehand
what he had to do, mindful of the geographic and strategic characteristics of
the region.
We are pleased to see North Korea’s statement of its intention to suspend
its nuclear weapons program. This has nothing to do with the crimes and the
blackmail of Bush, who is now touting the declaration as proof of the success of
his policy of genocide. North Korea's gesture was not aimed at the
government of the United States, before which it never yielded one inch, but, rather,
at China, a neighboring ally, whose security and development is vital for the
two States.
Third World countries are interested in the friendship and cooperation
between China and the two Koreas, whose union need not be from coast to coast, as
was the case of Germany, currently a US ally in NATO. Step by step,
unhurriedly but indefatigably, as befits their culture and history, they will continue
to weave the ties that will unite the two Koreas. With South Korea, we are
developing more and more ties. With North Korea, these have always existed and
we shall continue to strengthen them.
Fidel Castro Ruz
July 24, 2008
6:18 p.m.
Translated by ESTI
Envoi:
_http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/juev24/Reflections-24julio.html_
(http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/julio/juev24/Reflections-24julio.html)
Havana. July 24, 2008
Reflections of Fidel
The Olympic baseball team
THE indignation of the fans at Sunday’s serious setback thundered. That says
it all: fan-at-ics!
But people forget the fact that they [the players] are now in South Korea, a
country where we do not even have an embassy and where our athletes are
continuing their training….
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