Comrade Commander Hugo Chávez Frías, President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

Ministers and Heads of Delegations of the Member and Observer Countries of the Non-Aligned Movement,

Distinguished delegates and guests:

On behalf of the Movement's presidency, I thank Venezuela for providing the venue and organizing this 7th Conference of Ministers of Information of the Non-Aligned Movement.

This conference provides an excellent opportunity to exchange experiences and ideas, to formulate initiatives and projects, and to debate and define the strategies and specific measures that will enable the Non-Aligned Movement to respond successfully to the threats and inequality marking the information and communications scenario across our countries.

The unjust and anti-democratic international order to which we are expected to submit is responsible for the abyss between the North and the South in terms of the production, access and flow of information. It implies, moreover, denial of the right of our peoples to receive accurate, objective information - a prerequisite of the exercise of freedom and self-determination.

Monopolistic control of information and communications is a strategic element of the plans for imperial domination. For the Non-Aligned countries, the vindication of the right of access, the development of indigenous productions and a truly democratic, responsible and objective flow of information, is an overriding aim.

The need is urgent for promoting an accurate, fair portrayal of the conditions in our countries. We must demand that the truth be told. We must put forward our alternative. We must defend our rights. The new world order in information and communications, silenced twenty years ago, is not a pipe dream; it is a basic claim by our peoples that has now become even more pressing.

The increasing concentration and transnationalization of the ownership of the more influential mass media, coupled with control of advertising, now a business worth more than a thousand billion dollars a year, have resulted in replacing public opinion with manufactured opinion. The media, which manufacture rather than inquire into the truth, have now distanced themselves from the public and depend solely on advertising revenues. Over 90% of the news originates with a handful of transnationals. The owners are getting fewer and, consequently, the diversity of sources of information is in decline.

We are constantly bombarded with false allegations fabricated against some member states of the Movement. Our actions are often distorted or simply go unreported. Lying becomes routine. Attempts are made to interpret and write history from the viewpoint of the powerful and to justify discrimination and xenophobia. Conditioned reflexes are created by the media. Victims are turned into victimisers. Labels are attached and stereotypes are created to order. People become self-deceiving zombies.

Political manipulation of information and the connivance of the mass media are becoming extreme. Campaigns backed by multi-million funds and using the most sophisticated means are being pursued. We are witnessing media terrorism - the 21st century's most effective weapon in the hands of the powerful.

Cuba is well aware of its effects. For nearly five decades, it has also been subjected to radio electronic aggression, in breach of international law. Every week, nearly 2,000 hours of broadcasting on 30 frequencies targets Cuba from the United States, via a total of 19 sources (radio stations and television networks). These broadcasts, which interfere with our national services, incite to murder and other forms of violence, falsify and distort facts, call for destruction of the constitutional order legitimately established and endorsed by the Cuban people.

Meanwhile, Cuba is recognized by UNESCO as leading nation in terms of the quality of its education, a nation which teaches computing on a mass scale to its population and applies methods of teaching literacy using these technologies that have enabled Venezuela to declare itself a country free of illiteracy, and Bolivia to be ready to do the same by December 2008.

Also, in the midst of a worldwide energy and food crisis, the notion of consumerism as synonymous with wellbeing is still being irresponsibly promoted. News broadcasts, commercial breaks and virtually the whole of the "entertainment industry" impose a single model on society, despoiler of the environment and responsible for impoverishing the majority sections of society, while vilifying any proposal for an alternative to the existing order.

What hope is there for achieving an informed, participative and non-marginalizing society if, in the underdeveloped world, there are still nearly 800 million illiterates and 80 million children without primary schooling?

There are no miracle technologies we can use to eradicate poverty and underdevelopment. What is needed is a different world order; the political will among those who, apart from being responsible for and the beneficiaries of the present unjust, unsustainable situation, possess the necessary resources – which are today squandered on arms, luxuries and extravagance.

The existing international economic order, whose pernicious effects have been magnified by the process of neoliberal globalization, precludes all possibility of closing the so called "digital gap" - which is widening and exacerbating inequality and the polarization of prosperity and poverty.

The Internet offers the prospect of low-cost availability of the information being suppressed by virtue of the domination of the mass media. However, we should not deceive ourselves: the Internet is also penetrated by the large corporations. The huge difference in terms of access to the Internet in the South and the industrialized North again places us at a disadvantage.

Today, more than half the world's Internet users are in North America and Europe, despite the fact that the number of inhabitants living in these regions accounts for no more than one sixth of the world population. They are also the owners of three-quarters of the Internet's infrastructure. Democratic governance of the Internet remains blocked. The content circulating in cyberspace is overwhelmingly the work of the countries of the North, while 95% of it is in just 10 languages. There is an overriding need to place the Internet under the control of a multilateral, democratic institution, which promotes international cooperation and equality of access to technology among all nations.

In addition to all the foregoing, there is growing use by the great powers of information and communications technologies (ICTs) for the purposes of espionage against our countries, and of warfare. Large electronic networks, of which the ‘Echelon’ network is the best-known, operate with the collusion of the major transnational corporations. Similarly, the use of these technologies for vertical proliferation of nuclear weapons is also a cause of great concern. While we, the Non-Aligned countries, work for general and complete disarmament, and especially nuclear disarmament, a fortnight ago Washington announced the commissioning of a supercomputer, baptized 'Roadrunner', which will be dedicated to maintaining America's nuclear arsenal and consolidating its military hegemony.

As if that weren't enough, Colonel Charles W. Williamson wrote in the Armed Forces Journal the following: “America needs (…) building an air force (…) robot network (…) that can direct such massive amounts of traffic to target computers that they can no longer communicate and become no more useful to our adversaries than hunks of metal and plastic. America needs the ability to carpet bomb in cyberspace…”

Your Excellencies,

The Non-Aligned Movement should do much more in the field of information, in exercise of the mandate from our Heads of State and of Government at the Havana summit. Both as regards renewing the struggle for a new international order in the field of information and communications, and in order to generate initiatives that promulgate alternative visions to those now imposed on us, it is essential that we act jointly and coordinate our actions.

I take this opportunity to congratulate Malaysia for its efforts in revitalizing the Non-Aligned Movement News Network (NNN) and the Broadcasting Organizations of the Non-Aligned Countries (BONAC). These mechanisms have enabled a better flow of information about and from our nations.

There is an urgent need for multinational projects at regional and international level. The experience of Telesur, which arose on the initiative of President Chavez and was developed with the support of several Latin American governments, shows that it is possible to create an alternative. The Al Jazeera television network, threatened with being bombed, is another example. Initiatives like the Digital Solidarity Fund, set up to finance reducing the digital gap, should be encouraged.

Let us unite our forces in defending our right to the truth, to a fair and just international order and to international solidarity.

Let us work at this 7th Meeting of Ministers of Information of the Non-Aligned Movement in the conviction that, while the challenge is great, our determination is greater.

We can put up a struggle, and we will.

Thank you, very much.