The Lima Group has Fallen: Venezuela and Cuba Must be Respected

By Carlos Aznares on April 13, 2018

FEU VP Mirthia Brossard, Photo: Roberto Suarez

The alternative Summit of the People, that ran for two days prior to the 8th Summit of the Americas in Lima Peru, took a strong anti imperialist turn as large delegations of Cuban and Venezuelan civil society made it clear that they would not stand for any slander against their countries. In one panel that had so called Cuban dissidents speaking along with imperial puppet, OAS president Luis Almagro, was taken over by the popular voice of the people. Mirthia Brossard Vice President of the Cuban Federation of University Students (FEU) can be seen in this photo taking over the microphone to denounce the presence of dissidents with connections to terrorism against Cuba, as representing absolutely no section of Cuban society and who were only there because they were being paid by a foreign government. After a time Almagro and the others were forced to leave a back way into a smaller room to speak amongst themselves.

On the evening of April 12 a mass anti imperialist march, under the close watch of Peruvian police, took place in the center of Lima calling for the freedom of former President of Brazil Lula De Silva, the expulsion of the 24 foreign military bases in Peru, and an end to the hostilities against Venezuela. Earlier the Cuban delegation condemned offensive counter revolutionary billboards appearing on the streets of Lima against Cuba and Venezuela. Deputy Dean of the University of Havana Law School, Yuri Perez, condemned the billboards and said, “We came here for a respectful discourse but we categorically demand respect and our right to have the political system of our choosing.”

Below is an eyewitness analysis of the events in Lima from Carlos Aznares, editor of Resumen Latinoamericano. – editorial

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The Lima Group—the group that has gathered the rightist leaders of the continent under the common objective of collaborating for the ousting of Nicolás Maduro—has finally fallen.

They had tried and failed on many occasions, but this time at the 8th Summit of the Americas they were planning to go full throttle under the lead of Donald Trump. However, with the absence of Trump (Mike Pence’s presence is not enough to disguise their defeat) and the absence of ALBA’s presidents, a general vacuum was generated which contributed to a big devaluation of the meeting.

To make matters worse, the previous meetings of this euphemism called “civil society” had also failed. First, due to the attendance of NGOs appointed by Washington that had very little ethical and political weight (the case of the Venezuelan PROVEA is one of them) and also due to the battle that the Latin American delegates who defend Cuba, Venezuela and other revolutionary governments, have waged in their own territories.

In an effort to counter the massive anti-Venezuela campaign, delegates of Hugo Chávezs’ country replied with strong arguments in every forum and workshop they attended. The reaction of the rightist puppets was always the same; stigmatizing the supporters of the Revolution to the point of crying for help from the police, who didn’t even intervene, in a roundtable last Wednesday.

The political son of Trump, former Uruguayan foreign minister Luis Almagro, once again showed his allegiance to the empire by saying that “the situation in Brazil represents a growth of the democratic system”. Shortly after this declaration he participated in the official Summit and was repudiated by the Latin American delegates.

Apart from the reactionary provocations, it was demonstrated that both the OAS and those who carry out campaigns against Venezuela and Cuba are not getting the results they had hoped for. Without Trump as a protector, lapdogs like Argentina President Macri and others are taking refuge in the arms of U.S. Vice President Pence, but it is not the picture that they had all longed for. And they won’t be able to “execute” Venezuela as they thought they would on this occasion.

They won’t admit it but they lost. There is more than enough evidence to give hope to those who, in the streets of Lima and around the world, are fighting against this empire.

What is really embarrassing is how the new government of Peruvian President Vizcarra, has opened up all the channels of the Peruvian media to speak ill of Nicolás Maduro, Lula da Silva or socialist Cuba, or even interview people with no legitimacy so they can make charges against Cuba or make appearances in “debate” programs where the only guests are anti-Bolivarian. However, all these maneuvers have crashed against the enthusiasm and solid convictions of the popular militants who arrived from all over the continent willing to defend the Latin American revolutions and denounce the scourges of neo liberalism. This was demonstrated with a great popular concentration in front of the Brazilian embassy under the “Lula Livre” slogan and with the great anti-imperialist march through the downtown of the Peruvian capital on Thursday.

On the other hand, the People’s Summit was a success, with notable interventions by Atilio Borón, of Argentina, Luis Britto, of Venezuela, the former president of the Parliament of Ecuador, Gabriela Rivadeneira, the former foreign minister of the same country, Patiño and Cuban intellectual Enrique Ubieta. These held a real debate on the need for liberating the continent and argued about what goals the next struggles should have.

Together with them, hundreds of delegates from the Peruvian peasants and workers’ movements continue to warm up a Summit that became the voice of the people through an abundance of work and ideological clarity in front of the nauseating voice of the continent’s totalitarians, who have not been able to impose their arrogance this time around.

http://www.thedawn-news.org/2018/04/13/the-lima-group-has-fallen-venezuela-and-cuba-must-be-respected/

Source: Resumen Latinoamericano