CUBA: Repugnant lies and manipulation

Our spirit of sacrifice and the
empire’s extortion

THE first report I saw came from the Italian news agency ANSA on April 22.
"La Paz, April 22.— A commission of deputies are to investigate the case of Bolivian scholarship student who died in Cuba, and whose body was repatriated without several vital organs, including the brain.
"Guillermo Mendoza, president of the Chamber’s Social Policy Commission, announced that he would ask the Foreign Ministry for all facts on the case, according to the Catholic news agency Fides.
"The family of Beatriz Porco Calle, who was studying in Cuba on a scholarship, claimed that Cuban Embassy officials delivered her body without her eyes, tongue, teeth or other vital organs, including her brain, without any explanation whatsoever.
"Deputy Mendoza said he would carry out ‘a thorough review’ of Cuban legislation on organ transplants and of the agreements signed by Bolivian scholarship students when they travel to Cuba."
The Spanish news agency EFE has a similar article, but which adds, "…the family of the young woman demanded compensation from the Cuban Embassy in Bolivia, and when it was denied, ‘threatened to go to the press.’"
"I think the families have gone too far in asking for ‘compensation,’ said the (Bolivian) foreign minister, who affirmed that his government had done ‘humanitarian work’ in this case," the article said.
For any observer of reality, not much more was needed. Everything could be deduced about what had happened.
Despite that, I inquired about the formal paperwork, I asked for details and clarification in order to respond to this alleged and inhuman plunder of a corpse. I asked in addition for specific information, with exact figures, on our medical cooperation with Bolivia, a country of our America that the empire would like to destroy.
Since the election of Evo Morales, an Indian through-and-through, in long-suffering Bolivia, we have offered support in public health and education. I remember that afternoon very well. We were convinced that we could save many thousands of lives every year and restore the vision and full health to countless people, at no cost whatsoever to that nation. An intensive, proven comprehensive literacy program was to be implemented immediately in several languages, including the one most spoken: Spanish.
In Bolivia, 119 Cuban teachers worked with the goal of transmitting their experience and knowledge, in order to declare it a territory free of illiteracy in just two-and-a-half years. From the start, our country provided the equipment and educational materials necessary to meet this challenge: 30,000 21-inch televisions imported from China; an equal number of VCRs, with 16,459 transformers and 2,000 photovoltaic systems, which comprised a whole network for the subsequent educational courses throughout the day; 1.359 million flashcards for teaching people to read and write in Spanish, Quechua and Aymara; reading booklets and other materials that I will leave out so that this list will not be an endless one. Some solar panels from our reserves for war were sent to Bolivia. The likewise free transport of those materials was officially guaranteed by Cuba to Evo during a visit to our country a few weeks after his victory.
For its part, Venezuela, which had just been declared a territory free of illiteracy using the "Yes, I Can Do It" method, joined the program.
In Bolivia, 23,727 literacy stations were created, with 76.6 % of illiterate people joining up, and 62% of those who did not learn to read and write in elementary school are now able to do so; they were not charged a single centavo.
It was, however, in the healthcare field where the greatest cooperation efforts with that nation were made, there where Che and other Cuban and Latin American comrades and a young German internationalist died. In that sphere, no country can compete with Cuba today and perhaps not for quite some time. It is a form of free collaboration with the poorest, and at the same time a source for exporting services to other countries in the world that have many more resources available. In Latin America especially, and in the Caribbean, we have provided free cooperation in that field to the neediest.
There are 1,852 compatriots working ardently in Bolivia; of those, 1,226 are doctors; 250 are specialized nurses; 119 are health technicians; nine are dentists; and 86 are professionals and technicians in other fields; plus 102 selected people, dedicated to the vital services of all types needed by Cuban brigades abroad and patients admitted.
The Cuban Medical Brigade is working in 215 municipalities in Bolivia’s nine departments, attending to modest people and those who ask for their services. They have optimal equipment, donated by our country. In 18 ophthalmological surgical posts, 186,508 patients have received eye surgery. Their capacity easily exceeds 130,000 annually.
Our doctors have now provided almost 12 million consultations since the first ones arrived in Bolivia. Just by calculating, the number of lives saved may be estimated, given that, generally, their patients were not receiving any attention at all.
Perhaps the most striking aspect of our medical cooperation lies in the education of 5,291 young Bolivians who are studying medicine in Cuba, including 621 at the Latin American School of Medicine, where three classes have graduated with excellent results, and 4,670 from the new program. I am not exaggerating when I say that the firmest and most combative friends of Cuba in Latin America, and of course in Bolivia, include the families whose sons and daughters are studying that specialty in our country.
The number of the passport carried by the young student Beatriz Porco Calle, 22 years old, to whom the news article refers, was 5968246; she was from the department of Oruro, Samara province, municipality of Curahuara de Carangas, rural community of Toypicollana, of indigenous descent and Christian Adventist religion. She was doing well in her second year of medical school, at the Miguel Sandarán Corzo Faculty in Matanzas.
She suddenly fainted on March 6 in the bathroom of her dorm. Doctors and professors decided to take her immediately to the provincial hospital. The physical exam did not reveal anything that could explain the reason, nor did the laboratory analysis and other tests, including a CT scan. She recovered well and was released. She presented migraines and dizziness shortly afterwards. Further medical investigation. She felt stressed. The appropriate medications for such situations were applied. On March 23, at 7:30 p.m., loss of consciousness again. Once again to the emergency room, accompanied by a professor; intensive care, where she was diagnosed before dying with what is known as brain death.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Bolivian ambassador were notified, and they prepared travel documentation in case of death, which is what occurred almost one week later, on the 28th.
She was sent to the National Institute of Legal Medicine, which was obliged to do an autopsy to establish the cause of death. The pertinent paperwork was strictly followed. The student’s boyfriend and other classmates collected her belongings and sealed the baggage. In the Faculty, a mass on March 31. The Institute’s literal diagnosis: "death by endocraneal hypertension, hemorrhagic cerebrovascular disease due to congenital cerebral vascular malformation within the meninges. In that case, the extraction of the visceral block and the taking of relevant samples were inevitable.
A professor from her Faculty accompanied the body to Bolivia until it was given to her relatives. The Cuban Medical Mission paid for the cost of shipping the body to her hometown and for the funeral.
It is hard to write about this. Even harder to read the cables that are transmitting throughout the world the idea of a body stripped of its organs, obliging Cuba to provide these explanations.
What happened is quite clear. The empire needs to counteract truths about Cuba that it cannot bear. It schemes and encourages relatives to demand compensation; it assigns the task, as may be seen in one of the cables, and sends a repugnant lie around the world via a parliamentary deputy and the Fides news agency. From there, the demolition machine of its media and media techniques.
In our own country — I do not hesitate to say this — there are insensitive people, with scarce knowledge of certain realities, who will quickly and unthinkingly respond by saying, "we shouldn’t be helping Bolivia." They will never understand that both in politics and in revolution, the alternative to an erroneous or mistaken strategy is defeat.


Fidel Castro Ruz

April 24, 2008

7:15 p.m.

Translated by Granma International

www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/abril/vier25/reflexiones-25abril.html



Fidel Castro Article Stirs Bolivia

La Paz, Apr 26 (Prensa Latina) Bolivian media published on Saturday the Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro's article, entitled "Our Spirit of Sacrifice and the Empire's Blackmail."
Los Tiempos, El Nuevo Dia, and La Razon dailies highlighted on their front page the document published Friday on the Island, in which Fidel Castro denounced the campaign unleashed after the recent death of Bolivian student Beatriz Porto in Cuba.
La Razon, which circulates all over the nation, said the text debunks distorted information about mutilation of the young student's returned body, another US maneuver to counteract the humanitarian work by the Caribbean nation.
Los Tiempos also highlighted excerpts of the text which show how the empire encourages relatives of the student to demand compensation. It launched the abhorrent lie to the world through a parliamentarian and the FIDES news agency.
Commentator Juan Carlos Arana, of the private Canal A television station, mentions excerpts of that text and questions Evo Morales'government opposers, who are trying to turn the tragedy of a humble family into a political argument to attack the unconditional Cuban medical collaboration.

hr/iom/ga/mf

PL-10

www.plenglish.com/article.asp={0DE8962F-747E-4AD8-995B-CD6869EA1E61})&language=EN



Bolivia Denounces Media Manipulation

Havana, Apr 28 (Prensa Latina) Bolivian Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca accused his country"s political opposition Monday of manipulating a scholarship student ó s death in Cuba.
The head of Bolivian diplomacy denounced exploitation suffered by relatives of student Beatriz Porco, who died in March of a cerebrovascular disease.
Choquehuanca asserted that certain interests unleashed the defamatory campaign in Bolivia alleging supposed absence of several organs in the corpse, a situation clarified by Cuba.
Revolutionary leader Fidel Castro explained that to determine the cause of death, it was "inevitable to extract the visceral bloc and take relevant samples." The Bolivian foreign minister, who has been in Havana since Sunday night, asserted today that the reports presented by the Cuban government clarified the Island"s position toward the case.
Choquehuanca"s agenda includes a visit to the Latin American School of Medicine, where 10,000 youth from 30 Latin American and African countries and the United States are studying.
According to official data, 5,291 Bolivian young people are studying without cost in different Cuban faculties of medical sciences.

www.plenglish.com/article.asp={7A1E2B4B-5178-4D0C-ACF0-08F484A5D3BE})&language=EN



Cuban Cooperation Celebrated in Bolivia

Bolivian Solidarity with Cuba Movements and members of the Parents Association backed the unconditional support of Cuba

2008-04-28


Bolivian Solidarity with Cuba Movements and members of the Parents Association backed the unconditional support of Cuba and condemned defamatory campaigns against the island launched by the opposition in Bolivia.
In a demonstration at the Plaza Murillo in La Paz, Bolivia, protestors, carrying Cuban and Bolivian flags, condemned attacks launched against Cuba for its support of the Bolivian government. In recent months, the oligarchy in La Paz have been pressing to separate from Bolivia and are using the death of a Bolivian student in Cuba, who died from cerebrovascular complications earlier this week, as a pretext to criticize Cuba.
The president of the Parents Association of Bolivians studying in Cuba, Santos Melendes, read a joint declaration from Cuban solidarity organizations thanking the island for the quality of the education received by young Bolivians at Cuban Higher Education centers.
The declaration categorically condemned the manipulations and defamation of the opposition in the transfer of the remains of Beatriz Porco, who was studying medicine in Cuba. “We reject the dark political interests that are using the pain and manipulating the innocence of the Porco family to try to discredit the humanitarian efforts by the Cuban people,” reads the text.
The document also speaks about the reflections by Fidel Castro published on Friday, in which the leader of the Cuban Revolution denounced the campaign launched after the death of the Bolivian student and presented detailed information about the causes of her death.

www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/international/2008-04-28/cuban-cooperation-celebrated-in-bolivia/

About Cuba Solidarity:

www.cubacoop.com/cubacoop%20ingles/inicio.html

www.cubacoop.com/cubacoop%20ingles/yosipuedo.htm

www.cubacoop.com/cubacoop%20ingles/misionmilagros.htm

www.cuba-humanidad.org/

www.saludthefilm.net/ns/main.html

www.saludthefilm.net/ns/elam.html

www.ifconews.org



More news from CUBA:

- Cuban ophthalmologists apply new corneal transplant technique:

www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/cuba/2008-04-25/cuban-ophthalmologists-apply-new-corneal-transplant-technique/

- Counterrevolutionary provocation fails:

www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/abril/mar22/fracasa.html

- Statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cuba:

www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/cuba/2008-04-24/statement-issued-by-the-ministry-of-foreign-affairs-of-the-republic-of-cuba-/

- Assassination of Carlos Muñiz Varela:

www.cubanews.ain.cu/2008/0428carlosmuniz.htm

- Agent Kolar: Bush’s new hope for destabilizing CUBA:

www.granma.cubaweb.cu/english/news/art42.html

- Cuban Youth to open and close May Day Parade:

www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/cuba/2008-04-22/cuban-youth-to-open-and-close-may-day-parade/

- BOLIVIA is one sole Nation:

www.juventudrebelde.co.cu/columnists/2008-04-28/bolivia-is-one-sole-nation/

- The conspiracy to divide BOLIVIA must be denounced:

www.todosconbolivia.org/index.php

See also:

www.antiterroristas.cu

www.freethefive.org

www.thecuban5.org

www.wicuba.org

www.granma.cu/miami5/ingles/index.html

www.freeforfive.org/fr/home.html

www.cubainformacion.tv

www.cubanradio.cu