CUBA defends peace as an indispensable prerequisite for the development of all the peoples of the world.

For more than 50 years, our people have been the victim of aggression on the part of U.S. governments, obliging them to invest countless resources and energy.  They have been firm and tenacious in the defense of the country’s sovereignty and support the efforts of the UN and its struggle for peace.

One part of our territory has been occupied by force for more than 100 years and Cuba has never attempted or will attempt to use violence in order to recover it.  Cuba’s foreign policy is known and acknowledged by the international community.

At this moment, a crisis is arising that is worrying the peoples, stemming from news of the fighting that has broken out in the Caucasus, on the border with southern Russia.

When the USSR disintegrated, South Ossetia, annexed by force by Georgia, with which it shared neither nationality nor culture, retained its status as an autonomous republic with its local authorities and its capital, Tskhinvali. At dawn on August 8, Georgia, in complicity with the U.S. government, launched its forces on South Ossetia in an attempt to occupy the capital, which it publicly announced on the same day that the Olympic Games were inaugurated in Beijing.

It is a false claim that Georgia is defending its national sovereignty.

The Russian troops were in South Ossetia legally, as a force for guaranteeing the peace, as is known by the international community; they have not committed any illegality.

The request for the invaders to withdraw is just, and our government supports it.

Cuba, threatened by U.S. forces, cannot, as a matter of principle, agree with a cease-fire without the withdrawal of the invaders. If Cuba were attacked by foreign forces, it would never accept such a cease-fire.

Raúl Castro Ruz
President of the Councils of State and Ministers
Havana, August 10, 2008