CARICOM Celebrates 38 Years of Relations with Cuba
News from Cuba | Wednesday, 8 December 2010
The Caribbean Community (Caricom) and Cuba celebrate on Wednesday 38 years of relations that have become stronger with the solidarity cooperation Cuba has provided and the bloc's support in the international arena.
Both sides are hosting activities to celebrate the decision of Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados, Guyana and Jamaica of establishing diplomatic relations with Havana in 1972, thus breaking the hostile isolation the U.S. government wanted to impose on Cuba.
That gesture opened the way for the rest of the Caribbean territories to develop later on friendship ties and collaboration with Cuba. This led in 2002 to the creation of the CARICOM-CUBA Summits.
These meetings take place every three years to examine and increase cooperation and integration projects in education, health, power and trade, among others.
For nearly 4 decades of relations Cuba has granted scholarships, technical support, staff and medical assistance in situations of natural disasters free of charge, and a brig quantity of its collaborators give their service in CARICOM States.
The most recent example of solidarity is the deployment of over 1,200 doctors to Haiti to fight cholera epidemic that is lethaly affecting that empoverished nation, where it has killed 2,210 people and infected 23,222 since it broke out last October.
For its part, the Caribbean block has demanded in all international events the immediate lifting of the financial, commercial and economic blockade the US has kept against Cuba for nearly half a century. Its damages have already exceeded 1.154 billion dollars.
The Fourth CARICOM-CUBA Summit will be held in Trinidad & Tobago and will be focused on increasing cooperation programs and stronger ties of friendship. / PL
