Diaz-Canel: Cuba and Vietnam are an example of brotherhood

HAVANA, Cuba, Sep 27 (ACN) Speech delivered by Miguel Mario Diaz-Canel Bermudez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, at the friendly meeting on the occasion of the visit to Cuba of To Lam, General Secretary of the Communist Party and President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, at the Hotel Nacional, on September 27, 2024, “66th Year of the Revolution”.

Dear Comrade To Lam, brother of Cuba, General Secretary of the Communist Party and President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam;

Dear members of the Vietnamese delegation accompanying comrade To Lam;

Comrades of the leadership of the Party, the Government, the Cuban institutions;

Cuban pioneers;

Guests:

The visit of comrade To Lam makes us very happy, as always happens when good friends come to the house. To continue together on the road to the construction of socialism as sister nations, very close and committed, is a motivation that is renewed with these visits.

That joy for the meeting is not exempt from sadness. Here I would like to reiterate our heartfelt condolences and the greatest solidarity of the Cuban people, Party and Government with the Party, the Government and its brotherly Vietnamese people for the enormous damages caused after the passage of Typhoon Yagi, the most powerful typhoon in the last 30 years.

I would like to tell you that we highly appreciate the fact that your delegation has selected Cuba as the second bilateral destination for a State visit, after having assumed the post of General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam.

Vietnam inspires us. All the high-level delegations from your country that have visited Cuba have left an important mark in the consolidation of relations between our parties, governments and peoples.

And this visit, which is already historic because of what I said before, I am sure that it will mark a milestone in the process of deepening political relations between our nations and also in the increase of economic cooperation, mutually beneficial for both countries.

This meeting is also taking place in September, when we celebrate the 61st anniversary of the creation of the Cuban Committee for Solidarity with South Vietnam, on September 25, 1963, whose trajectory and history was recounted here by dear comrade Yolanda Ferrer, and the 51st anniversary of the historic visit of Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz to the liberated areas of South Vietnam in September 1973. We will never forget the image of Fidel flying the flag of the People's Liberation Army of Vietnam.

Cuba and Vietnam are an example of brotherhood that time has strengthened. No matter how strong the winds blew, or precisely because of that, our nations have known how to cultivate and enrich the beautiful legacy of friendship and solidarity of Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz, maximum leader of the Cuban Revolution, Army General Raul Castro Ruz and the beloved comrade Ho Chi Minh.

That is why I believe that it is the duty of those of us who uphold that legacy to transmit to the new generations the strength and nobility of the history that keeps tremendous and unique episodes of how that brotherhood was forged, so that they can reproduce it, consolidate it, nurture it and make it persist in time from generation to generation.

The testimony of the Cubans who studied in Vietnam and the Vietnamese brothers who came to study in Cuba is decisive in safeguarding that historical memory, because they are all part of the process of consolidation and development of each of our nations.
There are also significant experiences of Cuban builders, doctors, teachers, engineers who helped rebuild the country after the war and the correspondents of those epic years, who have a very special place in the heritage of Cuban cinema, thanks to which Cuba knows and feels as part of its own history the colossal epic of the Annamite people to achieve, as it has been achieved, to turn a country devastated by several wars into the ten times more beautiful nation dreamed of by Ho Chi Minh.
Cuba follows with admiration, respect and joy the economic and social successes of the renewal process initiated in 1986, which will soon be 40 years old. The Doi moi is the palpable demonstration of how a better society can be built with all the confidence of the people in their Party, Government and its leaders. And, basically, it is the most irrefutable proof that there are real possibilities of building socialism in nations like ours, always in accordance with the characteristics of each country.

I appreciate the unwavering support of the Party, the Government and the people of Vietnam in the struggle of Cubans against the unjust economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the Government of the United States, which accumulates more than six decades and which in the last five years has brutally intensified, affecting all the fundamental sectors of the economy, such as tourism, the export of medical services, energy, remittances, among others, and with the inclusion of Cuba in a spurious and unjust list of States that allegedly sponsor terrorism.

In Cuba's tireless struggle against this criminal blockade, we will never forget the countless signs of solidarity from the people of Vietnam, through its friendship organizations throughout that country, the gesture of those who recognize Cuba as their second homeland after being trained here as professionals, and the altruism of its pioneers who make handicrafts to raise funds for the construction of a new school in that little piece of Vietnam in Cuba that is the Ben Tre community, in the Bauta municipality of the province of Artemisa.

We Cubans respond to that solidarity with deep gratitude, respect and admiration for the people of Vietnam. It is in that spirit that a beautiful idea should soon come to fruition: the Ho Chi Minh Chair, to study and disseminate in Cuba the thinking of the Vietnamese leader and its common points with the thinking of Martí and the thinking of Fidel. The initial headquarters will be the University of Havana, but the dream is that there will be a branch in each Cuban university. In this noble project we have the support of the Vietnam Association of Friendship Organizations.

Ho Chi Minh is a symbol of patriotism and revolutionary heroism of the Vietnamese people; an example of morality and intelligence, and, in the current context, it is all the more necessary that his thought spreads, both to strengthen national pride and to spread to the world the always inspiring image of Vietnam, its glorious history, its rich culture and its immense love for peace.

During the visit to Cuba in April 2023 of a delegation of the National Assembly of Vietnam, a renaming ceremony was held for the Havana park where the beautiful monument to President Ho Chi Minh was erected 30 years ago, which you and your delegation, dear President, will visit next. Since then it has been called Ho Chi Minh Park, although the people used to call it that name with the same respect.

We Cubans are grateful, and perhaps some are unaware, that the first city in the whole world with a square named Fidel Castro Ruz is in the province of Quang Tri, in the city of Dong Ha, whose inauguration took place on September 15, 2018, just when it was the 45th anniversary of Fidel's presence in that Vietnamese region.

Our leaders live forever in the hearts of their people; not only in monuments, books or speeches; they live in their works, in the thoughts and ideas they left us, and in the dreams of building ever more beautiful and humanist nations.

All these are sufficient reasons to reiterate here today, with you, the wish that the brotherhood between our two countries consolidate even more as time goes by; that it grows and deepens in all sectors, and that it makes the road of socialist construction stronger and safer, under the sure guidance of the Communist Party of Cuba and the Communist Party of Vietnam.

May we continue to make progress together for the sake of peace, independence, democracy and the prosperous and sustainable socialism that our peoples deserve!

Long live forever the deep, noble and genuine friendship between Vietnam and Cuba! (Exclamations of: “Long live!”)

Long live forever the cherished legacy of Ho Chi Minh and Fidel Castro that holds our nations together! (Exclamations of: “Long live!”)
Long live socialism (Exclamations of “Long live!”)!
And, as always, Cuba and Vietnam united will win! (Exclamations: “United they will win!”)
Thank you very much (Applause).
(Shorthand Version-Presidency of the Republic)