The Cuban envoy was at the time speaking at the memorial ceremony held Friday at the Site of Monument, University of Guyana Turkeyen Campus.
On October 6, 1976 when the aircraft exploded just after take-off from Barbados, there were 57 Cubans, 11 Guyanese and five North Koreans on board.
Government officials, members of the diplomatic community and President of Guyana-Cuba Solidarity Movement (GCSM) Haleem Khan joined in a wreath laying observance in recognition of the 41st anniversary of the Cubana Air Disaster.
“We had memory. All of us, and especially the new generations, must know the truth of how the evil against Cuba and other nations of the hemisphere were articulated in those times,” Ambassador Marchante explained “The terrorist act was a shocking fact in a region where some nations had decided courageously to establish relations with Cuba exercising their right to national independence and sovereignty, they were Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados and Guyana.”
He said international battles were fought, such as the fight against the opprobrious Apartheid in South Africa and an active role in the Non-Aligned Movement, as well as against the criminal blockade imposed on Cuba, which has lasted more than five decades, among other actions, which did not please neither that US administration nor the successive ones that continued to promote terrorism to destroy the Cuban Revolution and other independent nations.
Adding that the policy of terrorism perpetrated against Cuba from abroad is responsible for the mourning and pain of many families, the Cuban Envoy said for that remembrance, Cuba decreed October 6th the Day of Victims of State Terrorism due to the abominable crime committed on that date in 1976.
Ambassador Marchante said Cuba rejects double standards and unilateral actions contrary to the Charter of the United Nations and to the principles and norms of international law.
“May this commemoration serve to reiterate Cuba's unwavering will to fight against terrorism and to express its firmest rejection and condemnation of all terrorist acts, methods and practices in all its forms and manifestations, regardless of their motivations, including those in which there are States directly or indirectly involved,” he noted.
He explained Cuba, in compliance with the 18 international conventions related to terrorism of which it is a State Party, has implemented relevant legal measures, such as the Law 93 against acts of terrorism.
Guyana-Cuba Solidarity Movement (GCSM) Haleem Khan said Guyana over the years has shared close relations with Cuba which was informed by the non-aligned policy.
This relationship, Khan said more than any other, has resulted in scholarships for Guyanese in the field of medicine, veterinary, engineering, pharmacology, agriculture and other technical areas. Such support contributed significantly to improving the intellectual capacity of the nation’s human capital to pursue our national developmental goals.
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