At the close of the High-Level Segment of the 80th session of the UN General Assembly. The call to lift the US blockade against Cuba was heard at the United Nations more than 40 times.
The speech that closed the marathon lineup of speakers who have taken the stage at the General Assembly since September 23th was by Ambassador Dionisio Da Costa Babo Soares, Permanent Representative of Timor-Leste to the UN. His remarks included condemnation of the long-standing unilateral blockade against the Caribbean country.
For his part, Nicaraguan Foreign Minister Denis Moncada said: “We denounce and condemn, along with all the peoples of the world, the horrific, odious, and execrable policies of criminal economic blockade. Aggressions with coercive, arbitrary, and unilateral measures.
“We reaffirm here our full and unequivocal solidarity and brotherhood with Cuba and Venezuela,” Moncada emphasized.
The list of countries that expressed their support for Cuba includes Brazil, Suriname, South Africa, Mozambique, Colombia, Vietnam, Angola, Nauru, Namibia, Guyana, Congo, Bolivia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, Dominica, Tanzania, Uganda, Sao Tome and Principe, and Mexico.
They also mentioned Cuba, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Barbados, Jamaica, Belize, Lesotho, Antigua and Barbuda, Tuvalu, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, the Bahamas, Grenada, Burkina Faso, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Laos, Russia, Belarus, Eritrea, Saint Lucia, and Honduras.
On Saturday, during his turn at the UN General Assembly podium, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez affirmed that the blockade against his country persists and is becoming extremely strict.
“This is a truly comprehensive and prolonged economic war, aimed at depriving Cubans of their livelihoods and sustainability. Also of their existence as a supportive, cultured, and joyful people,” he added.
Anyone who claims otherwise is deliberately lying, he emphasized. The very promoters of this war boast of its destructive effect and its ability to strike at the living standards of an entire people from any corner of the planet, he argued.
Finally he also pointed out that “it is cynical that the United States government, for purposes of political and economic coercion, labels Cuba a state sponsor of terrorism. A slander that this Organization does not share, nor any of its Member States.” He recalled that the island has been a victim of this scourge.