Cuba and Uganda deepen relations
Cuba and Uganda deepen relations
“Solidarity cannot be blockaded,” declares Cuban VP Valdés Mesa
The Cuban daily newspaper Granma reports that during the Nineteenth Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in Uganda and the Third South Summit in the same country, Cuba and Uganda deepened ties of cooperation and friendship. Granma is the Official Organ of the Communist Party of Cuba.
“The 19th Summit of the NAM in Uganda,” January 20, 2024
“The Third South Summit,” January 22, 2024
Cuban Vice-President Salvador Valdés Mesa and Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez met on the evening of January 18 with Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni. The Ugandan President expressed the affection and admiration of Africans for the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, who contributed not only medical attention to the people of Africa but also the formation of health professionals. Following the meeting, Valdés Mesa commented that the dialogue was a clear indication of mutual interest in increasing ties of collaboration in various ways.
Representatives of the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding on the promotion of commerce, which included themes such as food and biotechnology. And they signed a second memorandum on increasing cooperation in the field of health.
The Cuban Vice-President also met with Ugandan Vice-President Jessica Alupo, who thanked him for the possibility to have conversations oriented toward the strengthening of existing ties of cooperation. She recalled their previous meeting in September 2023, in the context of the Summit of the Group of 77 and China in Havana, when the two vice-presidents reinaugurated the Embassy of Uganda in Cuba.
Valdés-Mesa met with the President of the Ugandan Parliament, Anita Annet Among. She noted that the Cuban and Ugandan parliaments have maintained relations for forty-nine years. She reaffirmed the commitment of the Ugandan Parliament to continue fomenting relations. She noted that various laws approved by the legislature of Uganda favor commercial development with Cuba, which should stimulate ties of cooperation. For his part, Valdés-Mesa noted that the relations between Cuba and Africa are historic and have for Cuba a high priority. He declared, “Our culture, identity, and nationality have profound African roots, for which we feel pride.”
A National Meeting of Solidarity with Cuba was celebrated at the Ugandan Christian University, which was attended by more than a hundred persons representing various organizations and movements of solidarity with Cuba. Cuban Vice-President Valdés Mesa, on behalf of the President of the Republic of Cuba, awarded the Medal of Friendship to the President of the Ugandan Chapter of the Pan-African Movement.
Among the members of the Association of Ugandan Graduates in Cuba was Fatumata, whose life was saved by Cuban doctors on a medical mission in Uganda, and who later studied Foreign Languages at the University of Havana. Although she has not been to Cuba for four decades, she recalls well her seven years in Cuba, “making friends, learning to grow, not only as a professional, but as a person.”
Valdés Mesa explained that “we practice an international policy based in friendship and close collaboration with the majority of the countries of the world, under the principles of internationalism, in which a central axis is the indestructible relation with the peoples of Africa.”
He declared that “you have demonstrated to us that solidarity cannot be blockaded, that it will be permanent as a symbol of struggle in the face of injustice and the attempts by powerful forces to silence the truth.”
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