Heads of State and of Government,

Delegations and participants at the 4th PETROCARIBE Summit,

People of Cienfuegos,

Fellow Cubans:

The closing of the 4th PETROCARIBE Summit and the commissioning of the first stage of the Camilo Cienfuegos oil refinery, a PDV-CUPET S.A. joint venture company, alone make this an important ceremony. Other reasons, however, add to its significance.

On numerous occasions, our Commander in Chief has denounced the serious threat to the survival of our species posed by the wild consumption of oil by developed capitalist countries and by the rapid exhaustion of proven reserves, when no alternatives to eliminate dependency on this non-renewable resource in the short and middle term exist.

If, to the unfavourable correlation between supply and demand which prevails in the hydrocarbons market, we add such factors as the dwindling of crude inventories in the United States, the marked devaluation of the dollar, wars or the threat of armed conflict, speculation in markets and the world’s insufficient refining capacity, it is easy to understand why oil prices have skyrocketed.

This is a stifling and devastating state of affairs for Third World economies, particularly for the world’s poorest nations.

Factors such as rising costs in production and services sectors or the deepening of unfair trade, to mention only two, are coupled with the absence of international initiatives which, on the basis of equity and rationality, could at least mitigate the effects of this crisis and make the draconian conditions which govern economic and commercial relations in today’s world more flexible.

The one regional energy project of a new kind that represents an exception is, precisely, PETROCARIBE.

Let us look around the world for an exporter who supplies fuel on the basis of the principles of cooperation, solidarity and complementarity, principles which have nothing in common with free market laws.

Let us look for another financial mechanism that supplies hydrocarbons to poor countries, gives them the option of paying only 60 % of their value at the time of shipment and allows them to pay the remaining value over 25 years, charging an interest of 1 %.

We could also try and find out whether, in any other part of the world, the supplier encourages investing 40 % of the oil bill, whose payment is deferred, in projects and programs that benefit the people.

Perhaps U.S. leaders will consider adding the wrong of meddling in the internal affairs of PETROCARIBE member states to the list of innumerable crimes and sins of which they accuse President Chávez, because of this unprecedented payment scheme that is a means of combating illiteracy, developing public health, building industries, expanding services, in brief, of increasing our peoples’ wellbeing.

This is not, therefore, the closing ceremony of yet another international meeting on the energy crisis, of the many that adopt, as their one agreement, the decision to gather once again, later on and in a different place, to debate the same issues, which have only worsened over time.

The first aim of this ceremony is to close the 4th Summit of Heads of State of PETROCARIBE, which, progressively, is finding solutions to the difficulties created by the international energy crisis and whose agreements will offer us concrete answers, to the extent that we all manage to rally our efforts in this area.

The second aim, as I’ve already said, is to commission the Camilo Cienfuegos refinery, following the first stage of renovation.

Thus ends a long period of paralysis which began in April 1995 as a result of the demise of the Soviet Union and the intensification of the United States’ economic blockade on Cuba.

Immense efforts were required to preserve the facilities and our most valuable capital: the refinery’s excellent workers.

It is admirable that, in a mere 18 months and through an investment of only 136 million dollars, 15 projects should have been executed. These projects have not only allowed us to renovate the facilities but also to automate operations and reach the refinery’s capacity of 65 thousand barrels of crude oil per day.

Cuba would not have been able to rescue this great refinery were it not for the Bolivarian Alternative for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), a model for cooperation sustained by the same principles that guide PETROCARIBE, proof that, through unity and fraternal cooperation and by complementing each other economically, we can overcome the most difficult of circumstances and move forward.

ALBA confirms that a better world CAN BE BUILT.

This investment also included the construction of a water pipeline, the modernization of electric substations, the installation and expansion of new services (including telephone services), the improvement of street lighting fixtures and voltage, and road maintenance, measures which address the needs, not only of the refinery, but of other industries and communities in the area as well.

The productive efforts undertaken to complete the construction of the first one hundred petro-homes, today inaugurated as part of the Simón Bolívar community, are also worthy of praise.

This donation is yet another action which attests to the fruitful and exemplary cooperation with the sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, which affords us access to one of the most modern and efficient home-building technologies.

For these impressive results, we congratulate the people of Cienfuegos, who, as comrade Fidel once pointed out, have never failed the Revolution, its organizations, political or government leaders! They have shown us how we must work to make definitive progress.

A new stage in the development of Cuba’s petrochemical industry begins. Cuban and Venezuelan technicians are working in new projects to expand this refinery’s capacity, produce ammonia, urea, chlorine, PVC, paint, structural elements for petro-homes and expand fertilizer production, which is crucial to the development of agriculture.

Friends who are with us today, fellow Cubans:

Let us congratulate ourselves for the fruits of these efforts, for the results obtained by PDVSA and CUPET, by the people of Venezuela and Cuba. An especially heartfelt salute goes out to the President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, dear friend of Fidel’s and of Cuba’s, comrade Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías.

Upholding our socialist Revolution, 90 miles from a ferocious enemy, has not been easy, but here we stand, and will continue to stand, with nearly 50 years of struggle and victories behind us, resolved to continue sharing the fruits of our experience and our knowledge with other peoples fraternally and modestly, truer to the ideas of Bolívar and Marti than ever before, forever engaged in combat with the enemy, as Che taught us, upholding Fidel’s invincible truth and justice.

Let us loudly proclaim:

Long live PETROCARIBE and ALBA!
Long live Fidel and Chávez!
Ever onwards to victory!