New York movement hails Cuban leader

Esteban Lazo Hernández—who is a member of the Political Bureau of the Cuban Communist Party, vice-president of the Cuban Council of State and delegate to the Cuban National Assembly of People’s Power—spoke at the Church of the Intercession in Harlem on Sept. 20.

Esteban Lazo Hernández, left. Photo: Roberto Mercado

Hernández made an earlier presentation before the General Assembly of the United Nations regarding the significance of the Non-Aligned Movement meeting that took place in Havana, Cuba, earlier in September.

At the Harlem meeting, Hernández’s remarks included a stirring review of the historic roots of the Cuban Revolution, with a strong emphasis on the leadership role played by Cuban President Fidel Castro, who is still recuperating from surgery.

Hernández reminded everyone, especially a group of youth from the U.S. who presented him with flowers, about the accomplishments of the Cuban Revolution in providing free education and healthcare to people in the developing countries.

Hernández also talked about the growth of the Cuban economy in light of the “special period” following the loss of the Soviet Union as its main trading partner in the early 1990s, after the overturning of the Eastern Bloc countries.

Other members of the high-level delegation from Cuba who attended the Harlem meeting included Felipe Pérez Roque, minister of Foreign Relations; and Fernando Remírez de Estenoz, member of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party. A delegation from the Cuban Mission to the UN was also in attendance.

Other speakers included IFCO/Pastors Executive Director Rev. Lucius Walker, historian Jane Franklin, and National Lawyers Guild Executive Director Heidi Boghosian, who spoke about the case of the Cuban Five political prisoners. The Five were railroaded to life sentences in 1998 by the courts for exposing the terrorism of right-wing Cuban exile organizations in Miami, which have been attempting to overthrow the Cuban Revolution with the support of their allies in the U.S. government.