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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the April 3, 1997
issue of Workers World newspaper
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Cuba caravan organizers to defy blockade-for the seventh time

By G. Dunkel

For the last five years, the Cuba Friendshipment Caravan has defied the U.S. blockade of Cuba.

With the passage of the Helms-Burton Law, the blockade has grown more vicious and more intense. But the caravan has not flagged. Organizers are gearing up for its seventh border crossing, this spring.

From May 4 through May 10, the caravan will stop in 150 U.S. cities. Each stop will be a chance to explain the brutal boycott of Cuba and why it does not benefit workers and poor people in the United States.

May 14-15 in San Diego, Calif. and Buffalo, N.Y., the caravanistas will cross the U.S. border with material aid for Cuba's children.

Cuban children, like everyone else in Cuba, suffer from the blockade. Children are more vulnerable to deprivation, since they are growing. But the revolutionary government has taken special care to protect its children's education, health and future.

A famous sign in Havana points out that 200 million children in the world today sleep on the street. But not a single one lives in Cuba.

To challenge the blockade as illegal and immoral, caravan organizers do not apply for a permit from the U.S. government to take humanitarian aid. In the past this has led to confrontations at the border crossings. Yet almost all the material the caravan has collected has gotten through.

The caravan can use help in many ways: from collecting aid for Cuban youths-anything from computers to medical equipment to books-to hosting caravanistas, driving a car, helping them cross the border, traveling with them to Cuba or working on their emergency response teams throughout the country.

Readers can contact the Friendshipment Caravan at IFCO/Pastors for Peace, 402 W. 145^th St., New York, N.Y. 10031, telephone (212) 926-5757 (for eastern and southern USA) or IFCO/Pastors for Peace, P.O. Box 408130, Chicago IL 66040, telephone (773) 271-4817.

Or they can address email to the caravan at ifco@igc.apc.org or check a regularly updated web page at http://www.igc.apc.org/cubasoli/.

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