Cubanow.- The Spanish-French writer Ignacio Ramonet stated that the Cuban Revolution and its leader, Fidel Castro, exert – as never before - a great influence in Latin America, which explains why their detractors are intensifying their campaigns to discredit them.

Ramonet talked to a large group of students at the University of Computer Science (Universidad de las Ciencias Informáticas, UCI, in Spanish), on the periphery of this capital city, where the Cuban edition of his most recent book, “Cien horas con Fidel” (One hundred hours with Fidel) was launched.

“Never before has the Latin American social movement claimed in such a flagrant way its friendship and solidarity with the Cuban Revolution and with Fidel (Castro)”, the promoter of the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre underlined.

He explained that the volume, whose first edition sold in Spain under the title "Fidel Castro: biografía a dos voces" (“Fidel Castro: biography in two voices”), comes to light at an important moment for the Caribbean nation and its friends all over the world, “because the campaigns, the defamations are growing worse”.

He insisted that the political project established in Cuba in 1959 has never had such a great influence on the continent as today, with constructive relationships with several movements, parties and what he defined as democratic left wing governments.

In that respect he mentioned the cases of Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Brazil and Panama, and, in an implicit reference to the possible election victories of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Daniel Ortega and Ollanta Humala, respectively, “maybe tomorrow in Mexico, in Nicaragua or in Peru”.

The director of the monthly magazine, Le Monde Diplomatique, who was inducted into the UCI’s, “Men of the Future”, the most important recognition granted by the specialized study center, stated the reasons that motivated him to write the book.

“I didn’t do it to defend the Cuban Revolution, I have done it to defend the truth”, he made the point, qualifying as unjust the defamations and lies against the chief of State, like the one recently spread by the North American journal Forbes. That publication, branded as libelous by Fidel Castro, stated that the Cuban leader possessed a personal fortune worth millions.

The author of Propaganda Silenciosa (Silent Propaganda), European and North American youths, in contrast with Cuban youth, “connect” very little with the reality on the island, precisely because they are victims of these campaigns.

Ramonet revealed that after attending the 2002 World Social Forum in Brazil, he expressed his concern to Fidel Castro because the new generations opposing neo-liberal globalization did not feel the solidarity towards this country that his generation did.

Against Cuba’s enemies there is little to do, because they are fossilized, but a great mass of people of good faith, in solidarity, who have no arguments to defend the truth about the Revolution, deserve to be informed, said the intellectual.

The need for Cien horas con Fidel (One hundred hours with Fidel) was born from this, to prevent the anti-Cuban campaigns from influencing the main targets of his book.

The writer commented that there is a lot of talk about Fidel Castro in the world, but people never give him the chance to speak, and that – he confirmed - is the greatest merit of his book.

In addition, in Mexico, the director of Le Monde Diplomatique denied that his book on Fidel Castro might be a work he was asked to do by the Cuban government.

“I was not hired by the government (…) for me it was an intellectual wager more than any other consideration”, declared the French journalist of Spanish origin when he presented the work that has generated controversy to his Cuban and foreign colleagues.

In a Press Conference, Ramonet said that Castro never asked to know the questions beforehand, and he has not read the 26 chapter, more than 700 page book completely. The book has just been published in Spain under the title: "Fidel Castro: biografía a dos voces" (“Fidel Castro: biography in two voices”).

“The Mexican edition is just coming out now”, he said and he announced that it will also be published in Germany, France, Italy, The United Kingdom, Japan, the United States, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela and other American countries.

“Cien horas con Fidel” (“One hundred hours with Fidel”) collects the contents of the long conversations held by the Cuban leader and the left wing intellectual between the beginning of the year 2003 to half way through 2005 and it was published in Cuba by the State Council Publishing Office.

Ramonet said that the book is dedicated to the new generation of young people “who have not had the opportunity to know the thinking” of the Cuban leader which – in his opinion - is distorted by the mass communication media.

“I have tried to make it more of a history book than a biography or a newspaper interview. This is a political book”, he said and pointed out that he decided not to tackle the personal life of the chief of State, close to being 80 years old, 47 of them in power.

This is a book of politics, of struggles, of a battle of ideas on the foreign front, said Ramonet, who pointed out that the book has been very much appreciated in Spain, because they are reading a thinking they didn’t know and which has nothing to do with the “defamatory caricature” of the Cuban president which is presented in the media..

Ramonet, who announced that he will not charge royalties for the Cuban edition, pointed out that the last few interviews in the elaboration process with Castro were done in September 2005.

He acknowledged that the leader authorized him to reproduce fragments of his latest speeches, especially one given at the University of Havana in which he talked about corruption in Cuba.

Castro attended the first of several presentations of the book in Cuba, on which occasion the leader said that with this work Ramonet has reinforced the battle that the country is fighting for the truths it’s exposing in the face of the defamations of the empire (United States).

The Revolution has suffered much defamation, declared Castro, and added that this book reinforces the battle of ideas for truth and justice, in a text in which “there is no fraud, no lying and no dishonesty”, things they’ve tried to attribute to Ramonet in the face of the impact of this work.


May 30, 2006
Fuente: Rebelion