Fidel's Speech, May 14, 2004 (continued)

Listening to you talk of human rights in Cuba has a hollow, absurd ring. This, Mr. Bush, is one of the few countries in this hemisphere where not once in 45 years has there been a single case of torture, a single death squad, a single extrajudicial execution or a single ruler who has become a millionaire through having held power. You lack the moral authority to speak of Cuba, a dignified country which has withstood 45 years of a brutal blockade, economic war and terrorist attacks which have cost thousands of lives and ten of billions of dollars in economic losses. You are attacking Cuba for petty, political reasons, trying to obtain electoral support from a shrinking group of renegades and mercenaries who have no ethical principles whatsoever. You lack the moral right to speak of terrorism because you are surrounded by a bunch of murderers who have caused the death of thousands of Cubans through terrorist methods.

You do not hide your contempt for human life, because you have not hesitated to order the extrajudicial death of a secret, unknown number of people in various parts of the world. You have no right whatsoever, except for that of brute force, to intervene in Cuba's affairs and, whenever the fancy takes you, to proclaim the transition from one system to another and to take measures to make this happen. This people can be exterminated - you well know this- or wiped off the face of the earth but cannot be subjugated nor put once again into the humiliating position of a United States neo-colony.

Cuba fights on the side of life in the world; you fight on the side of death. Whereas you kill countless people with your indiscriminate, pre-emptive surprise attacks, Cuba saves the lives of hundreds of thousands of children, mothers, old and sick people all over the world. The only thing you know about Cuba are the lies that spill forth from the ravenous mouths of the corrupt and insatiable mob of former Batista supporters and their descendents who are experts in electoral fraud and capable of electing as President of the United States someone who did not obtain enough votes to claim victory. Human beings are not aware of, nor can they be aware of, freedom in a regime of inequality like the one you represent. No one is born equal in the United States. In the black and Latin ghettos and on the reservations for the Native Americans who once inhabited that land but were exterminated, there is no other equality but that of being poor and excluded.

Our people, educated in solidarity and internationalism, do not hate the American people nor do they want to see young white, black, Native Americans, mestizo or Latin soldiers from that country die - young people driven by unemployment to enlist in the military to be sent to any corner of the world in traitorous, pre-emptive attacks or in wars of conquest. The unbelievable torture applied to prisoners in Iraq has rendered the world speechless. I do not seek to offend you with these words, as I have already said. My only hope is that in your leisure time one of your assistants will bring these truths to your notice, even though they may not be completely pleasing to you.

Since you have decided that the die is cast, I have the pleasure of saying farewell to you like the Roman gladiators who were about to fight in the arena: Hail Cesar, we who are about to die salute you! My only regret is that I will not see your face because you will be thousands of miles away while I'm in the frontline ready to die fighting in defense of my homeland. In the name of the Cuban people, Fidel Castro Ruz. May 14/2004

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Fotos thanks to Granma, AIN, Reuters, AP