INTRODUCTION

This document provides an opportunity to learn the points of view of Cuba relating to the spurious maneuver imposed each year by the government of the United States of America at the now defunct Human Rights Commission —and that they will possibly try to repeat in the framework of the new Council— always resorting to intimidation and even blackmail to discredit the exemplary work of the Cuban people on human rights matters.

This report compliments those distributed as official documents of the 59th, 60th and 61st annual sessions of the Human Rights Commission, under the following codes: E/CN.4/2003/G/37, E/CN.4/2004/G/46, E/CN.4/2005/G/39; E/CN.4/2005/G/26; E/CN.4/2005/G/41; E/CN.4/2005/G/42 and E/CN.4/2005/G/43, respectively. The current document brings the topic up to date and provides follow-up to the report presented under the same title to the 62nd annual session of the Commission, which is available for consultation at the: www.cubaminrex.cu website.

Those same texts provide ample documentation on the important actions the Revolution has undertaken for the Cuban people in her sovereign determination to build a society that is every day more just and equitable.

Cuba does not recognize, nor will it ever recognize the legitimacy of any of the successive anti-Cuban resolutions imposed by the representatives of Washington on the Human Rights Commission. Neither will it accept any mandate deriving from those texts, including the one relating to the so-called Personal Representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

In the manipulation of the work of the United Nations human rights mechanisms against the Cuban people, the United States has had the active complicity of other governments of industrialized powers, in particular, those that seek shelter under the shadow of the Empire to enjoy the privileges deriving from the present unjust world order.

Cuba, as any other responsible member of the international community, will not become an accomplice to a maneuver that poses a mortal danger to the credibility of the international system of cooperation on human rights matters. Impunity and resignation to impotency are not acceptable options for the Cuban people.

The Cuban nation currently faces one of the most dangerous and real threats to its independence and sovereign existence, starting with the intensification of the policies, measures and anti-Cuban acts of the current Republican administration.

The projection and active execution by the only world superpower of an aggressive and markedly imperialist foreign policy based on irrationality and lies, has worsened the impact on the Cuban people, starting with the unprecedented increase of influence in the United States and the Bush administration of the terrorist anti-Cuban mafia of Miami. A plan to annex Cuba has been under implementation since 2004, updated with additional measures on July 10, 2006.

This report briefly summarizes some of the principal accomplishments of Cuba in the promotion and protection of all human rights of all Cubans; in particular, their civil and political rights, unmasking the lies about the country circulated by the multinational media serving the Empire.

The document denounces the numerous and continuous terrorist and mercenary actions against Cuba, carried out by groups that act with impunity from United States territory, and that often have received training, support and financing from US authorities. It also condemns the arbitrary detention and unjust and cruel treatment received in the United States by five young Cubans, five anti-terrorist heroes that have won the admiration and respect of all Cubans and for whom Cuba demands justice.

The report demonstrates that despite the Cuban people’s firm rejection of the anti-Cuban maneuver, Cuba has continued the broadest cooperation with all non-discriminatory international mechanisms of the United Nations structures on human rights matters. From its seat on the Human Rights Council, won with the support of more than two thirds of the United Nations member states, Cuba will maintain its firm commitment and its full defense of genuine international cooperation in the sphere of human rights.

There isn’t, nor will there ever be, a government with motives or legitimate reasons to promote a questioning or condemnation of Cuba for its record on human rights matters. Few governments have done so much in favor of the human rights of its people as Cuba in the 49 years of revolution. Honest people around the world are perfectly aware of this.

Many peoples have benefited from the unselfish and ongoing commitment of Cubans with the advance of human rights for all regions of the world. In Africa, Cuban blood was spilt, as Cubans died alongside their African brothers and sisters in the fight against colonialism and Apartheid. In the most remote mountain communities and difficult landscapes of dozens of countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, thousands of Cuban collaborators arrive to share the accomplishments of Cuba in health, education, sports and a wide range of areas of knowledge. The main contribution is the valuable help of its professionals, despite the island’s modest resources as a country of the South additionally submitted to a criminal blockade.

Cuba knows the government of the United States will continue using lies and pressures to maintain alive its anti-Cuban actions; it cannot do without the slanderous fabrications, it needs a pretext to continue stepping-up its policy of hostility, blockade and aggressions against the Cuban people. The US government will not renounce its effort to destroy the example of Cuba’s resistance, desire of sovereignty and independence.

The year 2006 ended without the United States being able to push through a new anti-Cuban project on human rights matters. Cuba hopes that the information in this document will be of use for all those that show a real desire to impartially, not selectively, approach the Cuban reality on fundamental objectives.

The Cuban people are ready to cooperate and have been fully accompanying the efforts to build a Human Rights Council that effectively responds to the historic demands of justice of the peoples of the South and the large social sectors in developed countries that also have been condemned to exclusion and poverty.

However, if the United States attempts to reedit its anti-Cuban maneuvers in the new Council, Cuba will be ready to defend the truth until victory. Cubans know that they will always have the solidarity of all individuals, peoples and governments in the world that value dignity and justice as principles to defend at any cost.