Excellencies:
We thank Mexico, President Pro Tempore of CELAC, for convening this meeting to discuss the necessary regional response to COVID-19, a disease that has quickly become a threat to all of our peoples.
We are pleased that the Pan American Health Organization is joining us in this regard.
We also thank the authorities of the People's Republic of China for sharing their best practices, as a reliable example of the cooperation that has distinguished the CELAC-China Forum.
We welcome the initiatives promoted by the Mexican Pro Tempore Presidency for the regional confrontation with the pandemic. The CELAC Network of Virologists, the first step in the search for joint solutions, offers each country the opportunity to share its experiences in this area.
We also celebrate the initiative of the Mexican Presidency of CELAC to coordinate a regional care strategy for COVID-19.
Ladies and Gentlemen:
This pandemic does not respect borders or ideologies. It is a challenge that is posed to everyone. Political differences must be removed at this dramatic moment from humanity.
COVID-19 has generated a crisis of multiple and devastating effects not only for health but for the economy, commerce and our societies in general, in the countries of the South, including our region that suffers the overwhelming and unsustainable burden of external debt.
It undoubtedly threatens everyone's life, and its impact will exceed the short term.
The need to work together to face the challenges is confirmed. Together we must generate the necessary responses, without waiting for miraculous aid from the industrialized North.
We must complement each other, providing the resources at our disposal, however, limited they may be. We cannot afford exclusions of any nature.
In the conjuncture of this pandemic, it is necessary to facilitate universal access to any vaccine or medication that manages to be produced.
It is inadmissible that some of our countries have to resist the application of arbitrary unilateral coercive measures, in violation of International Law and the Charter of the United Nations.
We demand the immediate end and without political conditions of the illegal measures imposed by the United States against Venezuela.
We reject the immoral indictment filed today by the US Department of Justice. against President Maduro and other Venezuelan leaders who are based on gross lies. It is a flagrant violation of International Law, a new aggressive measure against the sovereignty and self-determination of the Venezuelan people and a further act of contempt for the internationally recognized immunity to the high authorities of sovereign states.
I reiterate our solidarity with the people and the Government of Nicaragua and reject the measures that violate the right of that brother country to well-being, security, work, and peace.
Even in these conditions and aware of the profound impact that the pandemic will have on the socio-economic reality of our peoples, Our America can emerge victorious from this test if we focus on solidarity and unity in the diversity that has characterized CELAC.
Ladies and Gentlemen:
Cuba is following all the protocols established by the World Health Organization for confronting COVID-19. It has taken specific measures for each of the three phases in which the confrontation with the pandemic in the country has been structured.
All state and government structures and society as a whole are involved in this process. The epidemiological situation and the progressive application of these measures are evaluated daily.
The primary care structure of the Cuban public health system in all communities has facilitated the active investigation process and the prompt identification of cases, guaranteeing epidemiological control.
We have a national control and confrontation plan focused on guaranteeing the health of the town and that of visitors and resident foreigners.
Cuba's experience in dealing with transmitted diseases is well known; as well as the scientific development of our country, with a pharmaceutical industry of high technological level, which has guaranteed the availability of Recombinant Human Interferon Alpha 2B and 21 other medications that are used for the treatment of patient complications.
We have highly qualified medical personnel who have fought complex epidemics such as Ebola, cholera or malaria in several countries.
Cuba is offering its modest cooperation to those who have requested it and is willing, to the extent possible, to continue doing so. At the same time, we will continue to share the experiences gained in meeting this challenge.
On March 24, at the First Extraordinary Meeting of Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Health of the Association of Caribbean States, Cuba proposed that a virtual technical workshop be organized among health specialists from the Americas to share experiences and exchange information on interest.
Recent messages from the United States Department of State against Cuban international cooperation will not stop our humanist vocation. They join the failed, inhuman and disrespectful campaign of the government of that country against Cuba and affect the already deteriorated credibility of the United States Government, by penalizing and persecuting international solidarity, for political reasons and using false pretenses.
We support the urgent call of the Secretary-General of the United Nations to "end the evil of war and fight the disease that is devastating our world: the coronavirus pandemic." All wars, including unconventional ones, must stop.
As Fidel said, "doctors and not bombs, doctors and not smart weapons."
Thank you.