CubaMinrex. Sitio del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Cuba

Statement by Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, Minister of Informatics and Communications at the opening of the 12th Editions of the Information Technology Convention and Fair 2007

Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentleman,

We warmly welcome you to this 12th Edition of the Information Technology Convention and Fair 2007, and feel sure that this will provide the perfect context in which to exchange scientific and professional experiences and practices.

For being here with us, we would like to thank the delegates from international and regional organisations, representatives of governments and of the academic sector, businessmen, non-governmental and professional organisations and all the personalities and guests who have come from all around the world to be at this event and who today honour us with their presence.

Our thanks also go out to the national delegates, organizers, support staff and, in general, all those who have worked to make this important event possible.

On the agenda of this Convention are congresses, conferences, workshops, seminars and meetings on the most current and pressing topics related to Information Technology and Communications . Both the issues to be discussed and the authority and commitment of the participants foretell that the motto of this event will be upheld:

“Information Technology and Communications and their Contribution to a Better World”.

Something which also surpasses, although does not yet fulfill our goals and desires, are the results that our country now displays, with complete modesty, in the field of Information Technology and Communications.

This all has a highly social character, completely unrelated to any manifestation of consumerism, as a new kind of specialist is being trained, who is completely committed and possesses ethical values far removed from the patterns promoted by the globalized and neoliberal world.

The substantial improvement of the technological infrastructure and the massive and profound programme to train human capital from an early age are examples of the great effort made by the Socialist State to rapidly informatize Cuban society as a means of increasing the quality of life, efficiency and competitiveness of the country, guaranteeing the stability, reliability, vitality, security and inviolability of these technologies.

By means of an example, it is worth mentioning the more than eleven thousand students currently training to a high professional level in our higher education centres; the IT Polytechnic Universities which are teaching some 38 000 pupils of intermediate education; and the 660 Computer Youth Clubs, located throughout the country, which have trained more than one million Cubans of all ages.

Work is also being done in other key areas. For example, in the technological infrastructure our communication networks will continue to improve, and the range of equipment available will be increased and modernized, with priority being given to the sectors of greatest social relevance: health centres, education, cultural and scientific institutions, among others. In the education sector, all schools now posses IT and audiovisual resources such as learning tools, even in the most remote centres, which run off solar power, and only have one pupil.

But perhaps the element most deserving of merit is the situation in which this development has taken place; under the cruelest and longest standing economic, commercial and financial blockade ever known to man, and whose terrible and genocidal actions have intensified with the current out-of-control administration.

Internet access in Cuba dates back to 1996, when the US government, under section II of the Toricelli Law and enthusiastic about the destabilizing effect they imagined this medium would have, granted Cuba an access license. Today, despite the fact that international fibre optic cables run very close to Cuban shores, the rules of the blockade prevent connection to these, meaning that the nation is forced to use a satellite channel with a mere 65 Mbps broadband for output and 124 Mbps for input. Connection via fibre optics would not only permit a faster connection, but also significantly lower costs.

These same rules state that any new addition to or modification of the channel require a license from the US Department of Treasury.

Internet, as a common global area, certainly has some big challenges to overcome; not just those relating to its use by mankind as a whole, and the consequent inclusion of all countries in the management of it, but also relating to the eradication of universally condemned scourges, such as the diffusion of pornography, encouragement of terrorism, racism, fraud, spread of fascist ideologies and any kind of manifestation of cybernetic crime.

However, the rationality of the human spirit must prevail. The Net is not only giving a means of expression to those sectors silenced by the mass media, but is also spreading important messages in favour of aspects of crucial importance to humankind, such as peace, protection of the planet and justice, to give but three examples. Veritable communities of exchange, solidarity and cooperation are emerging in a wide range of areas of human knowledge, of which the Cuban networks are notable examples.

But another great challenge, hushed up by rich countries, is to eliminate its selective and elitist character, which is now bringing the inequalities and limitations of the real world to cyberspace, thus creating what has become known as the “digital gap”.

There are millions of people around the world who are very far from becoming “internauts”, when they don’t yet know how to read or write, and their great daily struggle is surviving hunger, thirst and disease. With the political will of the governments, international cooperation and a minimum amount of the resources that the so-called developed world currently squanders on publicity, over consumption and the weapons campaign, the Internet could become a vehicle for the implementation of a cultural and educational revolution that promotes knowledge and coveys the education, culture, cooperation, solidarity and ethical and moral values that this new century needs, encouraging the most noble human sentiments and casting aside the inhuman, selfish and individualist conducts imposed by the capitalist system, headed by the United States.

The indicators used to measure the “digital gap” should be revised and adjusted to the level of development achieved by the ITC. It is not right to say that the gap is closing when the parameters used for comparison are more than five years old. It is shameful to hear that telephonic penetration in Africa is growing more than in Europe, when countries in the old continent have more than one line per capita. Why not talk of the disparity in the levels of ITC use? Why not include recent technology such as Third Generation (3G) or broadband in the indicators?

With regards to the technological infrastructure, the US blockade not only prevents us from acquiring equipment and IT programmes from American companies, but also, due to its extraterritorial nature, also persecutes our commercial operations with companies of other nationalities, even in the most distant regions. Using pressure and blackmail, they attempt to destroy any commercial transaction with Cuba.

The persecution extends to the Web. Its no-longer just a matter of the Office for the Control of Foreign Assets of the Department of Treasury, which keeps watch and prevents American citizens and institutions from using the Web as a means by which to perform transactions with Cuban institutions; blocks are also put, with the same brazenness, on attempts to download software and information (including free downloads), if the IP number is identified as being from Cuba.

It is fallacious that this same government should talk of reducing the “digital gap” and of “free access to the ITC”.

With the premise that knowledge is the patrimony of mankind, it is imperative that the presence and distribution of informational capital and access to this be democratized.

Cuba will not give in. Over more than forty years of blockade, we have learnt to dodge a wide range of obstacles with equanimity and intelligence. One precept has characterized the socialist state: the creative, just and equitable social distribution of every scarce resource.

In this sense, the country has organised the rational and efficient use of the resources, both in terms of equipment and connectivity, on a mass social scale. This is how key sectors such as health, education, scientific centres, cultural institutions and companies are prioritized, an option which is universally recognized as a valid alternative for the countries euphemistically known as “developing” nations, and which the experts have labeled the “social appropriation of the ITC”.

Many governments, who although they don’t have the limitations of the blockade, lack resources, could have done so much if they didn’t compulsively and to the letter follow the models of capitalist use and consumption!
Maybe their “statistics” wouldn’t improve, at least those usually recognized, but they would surely manage to bring technology to the community as a whole and reduce their dependency on consumption patterns that bear no relation to our situations.

Distinguished guests,

The constant failure of the empire’s destructive actions and plans, in the face of the firm stances of our people, are only too familiar with the frustration that the reinforcement of the Cuban Revolution and the growing consolidation of the left-wing movements in Latin America cause them. These situations enrage them and intensify their hegemonic designs, multiplying their efforts of destruction in a dangerous and irrational manner.

With the fraudulent elections and consequent arrival of Bush as president, the dream held so dear by the American extreme right since the time of Reagan became true. The neo- conservatives, one of the most influential pressure groups of the American extreme right, were going back to the White House, and with them were the main exponents of the American arms industry. For them, the sad and still mysterious 9/11 attack constituted a powerful pretext under which to begin, with the motto of the “fight against terrorism”, actions that would have shocked the strategists of the Third Reich.

This was the time to intensify the psychological war and define the manipulation of public opinion. The so-called neo-conservative “think tanks” worked with extreme precision to ensure that the American people, their legislators and the world, if possible, would support and second the Administration’s expansionist plans and designs for universal control. Information Technology and Communications in general and the Internet in particular would have a somber role to play.

The Pentagon was quick to announce its decision to add a fourth army to the specialized corps of the conventional war. The classic elements: land, air and sea are now joined by Cyberspace.

Perhaps this decision was sparked by the insubordination on the Net of the Psychological War, implemented by the extreme right as a result of the events of 9/11. The so-called press and informative operations, so carefully prepared to instigate an atmosphere of war via the media, collided on the Internet with innumerable messages against this ideology sent by a wide range of pacifist sectors around the world.

Maybe the other big surprise has been to see how the American public, tired of swallowing the news written by the traditional transnational press organs, went on the internet to look for alternative opinions from those which appeared in the mass media, after having been carefully prepared in the White House.

In this great bellicose escalade created by the US government and protected by the so-called “crusade against terrorism” (which, by the way, doesn’t even target criminals who have confessed to blowing up a commercial flight with 73 innocent people on board), the range and scope of the current technological possibilities are used to step up the control over governments, companies and individuals, including the American people themselves.

Following the still-unclear events of 9/11, the neo-conservative right wing created the so-called “Department of Homeland Security”, the DHS, which coordinates 22 agencies of the US security system, with more than 18 thousand employees in its central offices.

As a result of the Missile Crisis and in response to the communication difficulties experienced by President Kennedy, the security agencies have given special attention to this matter. Today, the majority of these agencies are linked, in one way or another, to the Information Technology and Communications, they act as government advisers and what is most important is that they comprise the presidents of the main communication providers, as well as of IT, finance and air and space companies.

These agencies, at the request of the government and with the assignation of huge funds, have developed various methods and programmes to strengthen existing technologies or create new possibilities of intercepting communications, systems access and data bases, vehicle and personal identification and tracking systems. These complex networks include antenna systems, interceptor stations, radars and satellites, supported by submarines and spy planes, all linked to super computers and specialised applications.
On the other side of the Atlantic, and in response to this, Europe is developing its own project, with the same resources, objectives and an equal amount of irrationality.

It would be very naïve to think that the service and technology providers, in their collaboration with the aforementioned agencies, weren’t facilitating information which makes the espionage and intelligence work of these agencies possible. Bear in mind that in accordance with the stipulations of the “Patriot’s Act”, the government is authorized to demand information (secret or otherwise) from any company, if they consider it to be in the interest of national security.

Last year, the press published several stories which illustrate this issue very well:

One of these referred to the supposed secret relationship between Google, the popular internet search engine, and the US intelligence community. According to the media, the search engine facilitates data bases containing varied information about their users: personal details, key words, search preferences, sites visited and behavioral patterns.
However when attempts are made to combat the scourge of pornography, it will not allow access to its bases.
Another news item is related to the acknowledgment made by Microsoft of their collaboration with the US secret services. The press referred to the fact that, for the first time, the company responsible for the development of the Operational Systems installed in 90% of computers worldwide, acknowledged their exchanges and collaboration with the security agencies.

Not long ago, Bill Gates declared that those in favour of open software are the new communists.

These actions bring the destabilizing power of the empire to threatening new levels. Mankind must be on the alert and follow this situation closely.

For Cuba, also a victim of the intensification of the blockade, the creation of the commission for transition in Cuba and the so-called “Plan Bush”, -which now contains secret clauses -, this phenomenon isn’t new. The means change but the objectives remain the same as those denounced by our José Martí in 1892:

“Our enemy is obeying a plan: to provoke us, disperse us, divide us and suffocate us. That is why we obey a different plan: to show how tall we stand, to come together, unite, defy them, free out homeland at last. Plan against plan. Without a plan of resistance it is impossible to defeat a plan of attack”.

Throughout its history, the Cuban Revolution has been forced to dodge the most perverted of plans, a key to which have been the security measures and actions that it has taken on all fronts. The examples would be never ending.
Faced with these new threats and the country’s resolute desire for progress, it is necessary to remodel strategies and actions that will help to ensure the constant growth of the security of our networks and the permanent preparation of our people. In this context, we will continue with the same stance that has guaranteed our safety on other fronts and which comrade Fidel summed up in the Central Report to the First Congress of the Party:

“As long as there is imperialism, the Party, the State and the people will give their utmost attention to the defense services. The revolutionary guard will never cease in its vigilance. History shows us with all too much eloquence that those who forget this principle do not recuperate from their mistake”.

Faced with the empires backward policy, the progressive forces of the world are strengthened, new leaders committed to their people are emerging, and the sense of unity is increasing, all for a better world.

In Latin America, the dreams of integration and independence of our martyrs are beginning to come true. In resistance to centuries of foreign exploitation, the failure of neoliberalism and the annexationist Free Trade Agreements (FTAA), new integrationist projects of collaboration that have a marked social dimension and a humanistic, supportive and internationalist perspective are emerging, under the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA)

Information Technology and Communications will also be at the centre of the area’s integrationist plan. It will be necessary to find the strategic alliances needed to confront hegemonic attempts in this new battle field, and which make it possible to put a new seal on the sovereignty of our peoples. This will make it possible to find new systematic solutions which, as well as becoming effective and efficient schemes for the use of these technologies, will also minimize the risks that they will incur, and allow for the timely prevention of the United States, as José Martí said, landing, with more force, on the land of our America”.

These technologies constitute one of the tools for global extermination, as despite the known risks that they incur, they are also necessary to continue to advance down the path of development. Therefore, our country is incorporating the concept of the Cuba Network as a means of expressing the results which we have so far achieved and will continue to achieve in the future.

The wild horse of the new technologies could and must be controlled, and Info-communications must be used to serve peace and development.

Thank you very much.

 

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