CubaMinrex. Sitio del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Cuba

Statement by Ambassador Rodolfo Benítez Verson, deputy permanent representative of Cuba to the United Nations, on agenda item 116: “follow-up to the commemoration of the two-hundred anniversary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade”. New York, 9 December 2010

Mr. Chairman,
Slavery is one of the biggest human tragedies ever known.
The consequences of oppression, violence, and socio-cultural damages related to the transatlantic slave trade live on through centuries.
Cuba was one of the first colonies to receive African slaves. Between 1503 and 1873, more than one and a half million enslaved Africans were transported to our island from African costs.
In Cuba, as in nearly the entire Latin American continent and the West Indies, there are evident traces of the slave trade, as a result of the colonizing drive and greed of European traffickers who used slave labour to build their colonial empires.
What is Cuba today cannot be understood, if the way in which transatlantic slave trade marked forever the history of our country is unknown.
We Cubans deeply appreciate our African roots. We proudly declare that the Cuban people has directly and naturally inherited the gallantry, courage, and endurance of Africa, which, for centuries, has been heroically facing challenges that still remain.
Our cultural wealth and idiosyncrasy are, to a great extent, expressions of the cultural heritage of African peoples, which enriched us with their wisdom, traditions, languages, religious beliefs, music, temperament and rebellious spirit. The courage and daring of the slaves who rose up against exploitation nourished the freedom-loving spirit and sense of independence of the Cuban people.
Cuba has always been with Africa and Africa with Cuba. For almost three decades, more than 381 thousand Cuban combatants fought selflessly to defend the integrity and sovereignty of African sister nations. Only the remains of our fallen comrades and the honor of having done their duty returned from Africa.
Today, over 2,400 Cuban collaborators render their services in 35 African nations, in order to advance their development in diverse areas such as public health, education, agriculture, sports, construction, among others.

Mr. Chairman,
The once colonial metropolises must honour their historical debt to those who suffered slavery and the transatlantic slave trade for centuries.
It is not possible for the former metropolises to wash their hands of their past and responsibilities.
Africa will remain marginalized and the colonial heritage will be endless, as long as there is a deeply unjust and unsustainable political and economic order, where a few consume almost all the resources, and most of the world population is marginalized from the so-called benefits of neoliberal globalization. 
It is unacceptable that Africa continues to finance with its resources the opulence of rich countries, which will continue making promises of new official development aids, failing to keep most of them, and charging the foreign debt higher amounts for services, than the amounts committed for development aids.
The statements we make in this room are worth nothing, if African countries are then forced to spend five times more resources in paying opprobrious foreign debts than in healthcare and education programs.

Mr. Chairman,
Cuba supports and co-sponsors the draft resolution annually presented before the General Assembly under this topic, by CARICOM member States and African countries.
We recognize the importance of organizing annual activities, and holding an annual meeting of the General Assembly to commemorate the International Day of Remembrance. We also endorse the initiative to erect a Permanent Monument at the United Nations Headquarters to the victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade.
That is the least the United Nations can do to commemorate the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade.

Thank you

(Cubaminrex-Misión ONU)