Collection of Fidel Castro speeches

[Guest]

Does anybody have any idea if their exists a Castro anthology, complete speeches, reader or anything like that, which contains many of his speeches unabridged. I am desperate to find one.

[Breast Pump]

this is probably NOT what you are looking for but this is all I have available tonight.


Speech by Dr. Fidel Castro Ruz at Monterrey, Mexico
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A Better World is Possible

by
Fidel Castro

[Note by La Voz de Aztlan: On March 22, 2002 the
United States delegates to the International Conference
on Financing for Development in Monterrey, Mexico,
following instructions from the Bush White House, left
their seats at the beginning of this speech by Fidel
Castro. Had they stayed, this is what they would have
heard.]

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Not everyone here will share my thoughts. Still, I
will respectfully say what I think.

The existing world economic order constitutes a system
of plundering and exploitation like no other in
history. Thus, the peoples believe less and less in
statements and promises.

The prestige of the international financial
institutions rates less than zero.

The world economy is today a huge casino. Recent
analyses indicate that for every dollar that goes into
trade, over one hundred end up in speculative
operations completely disconnected from the real
economy.

As a result of this economic order, over 75 percent of
the world population lives in underdevelopment, and
extreme poverty has already reached 1.2 billion people
in the Third World. So, far from narrowing the gap is
widening.

The revenue of the richest nations that in 1960 was 37
times larger than that of the poorest is now 74 times
larger. The situation has reached such extremes that
the assets of the three wealthiest persons in the
world amount to the GDP of the 48 poorest countries
combined.

The number of people actually starving was 826 million
in the year 2001. There are at the moment 854 million
illiterate adults while 325 million children do not
attend school. There are 2 billion people who have no
access to low cost medications and 2.4 billion lack
the basic sanitation conditions. No less than 1 1
million children under the age of 5 perish every year
from preventable causes while half a million go blind
for lack of vitamin A.

The life span of the population in the developed world
is 30 years higher than that of people living in
Sub-Saharan Africa. A true genocide!

The poor countries should not be blamed for this
tragedy. They neither conquered nor plundered entire
continents for centuries; they did not establish
colonialism, or re-established slavery, and, modern
imperialism is not of their making. Actually, they
have been its victims. Therefore, the main
responsibility for financing their development lies
with those states that, for obvious historical reasons,
enjoy today the benefits of those atrocities.

The rich world should condone their foreign debt and
grant them fresh soft credits to finance their
development. The traditional offers of assistance,
always scant and often ridiculous, are either
inadequate or unfulfilled.

For a true and sustainable economic and social
development to take place much more is required than
is usually admitted. Measures as those suggested by
the late James Tobin to curtail the irrepressible flow
of currency speculation --albeit it was not his idea
to foster development-- would perhaps be the only ones
capable of generating enough funds, which in the hands
of the UN agencies and not of awful institutions like
the IMF, could supply direct development assistance
with a democratic participation of all countries and
without the need to sacrifice the independence and
sovereignty of the peoples.

The Consensus draft, which the masters of the world
are imposing on this conference, intends that we
accept humiliating, conditioned and interfering alms.

Everything created since Bretton Woods until today
should be reconsidered. A farsighted vision was then
missing, thus, the privileges and interests of the
most powerful prevailed. In the face of the deep
present crisis, a still worse future is offered where
the economic, social and ecologic tragedy of an
increasingly ungovernable world would never be
resolved and where the number of the poor and the
starving would grow higher, as if a large part of
humanity were doomed.

It is high time for statesmen and politicians to
calmly reflect on this. The belief that a social and
economic order that has proven to be unsustainable can
be forcibly imposed is really senseless.

As I have said before, the ever more sophisticated
weapons piling up in the arsenals of the wealthiest
and the mightiest can kill the illiterate, the ill,
the poor and the hungry but they cannot kill ignorance,
illnesses, poverty or hunger.

It should definitely be said: "Farewell to arms."
Something must be done to save Humanity! A better
world is possible!

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