As our people were informed when the Argentine foreign minister visited Washington and his spokesperson made unfortunate and insulting statements, new maneuvers against Cuba are being perpetrated within the Human Rights Commission (HRC), which will begin sessions on March 18 in Geneva.

On this occasion, given the way that the Czech government has been weakened and discredited after presenting the resolution against Cuba for the last three years, the United States is trying to find a new "sponsor" for the anti-Cuba monstrosity, concentrating on some Latin American governments.

But to date, the State Department has had little success. The president of Mexico, Vicente Fox, has made it clear that his country will not sponsor any measure of that kind; the president of Chile, Ricardo Lagos, stated unflinchingly in 2000, and recently reiterated, that his country would not involve itself with a new condemnation of Cuba; similarly, the governments of Brazil, Venezuela and Ecuador have not supported and still do not support the unjust maneuver being planned once again for Geneva.

The methods used by the United States to achieve this objective are the same as ever: pressure, blackmail, and the imposition of political and economic conditions.

In support of its efforts, the United States has "circulated" an aide-mémoire in various Latin American capitals, with every precaution to keep Cuba from knowing about it. The aide-mémoire calls for the adoption of a new resolution condemning Cuba at the 58th HRC. But we have learned that this text states that the absence of any action of this nature could be interpreted as "acceptance by the international community of Cuba’s human rights policies," which could lead the "small dissident community" on the island to feel abandoned. The latter is a clear reference to the miniscule counterrevolutionary groups created and sustained by the United States itself, and totally discredited.

This aide-mémoire urges the Latin American countries to present a resolution condemning Cuba at the next HRC session, stating that the Commission should "request a visit to the island to investigate the human rights situation in Cuba." Thus, it is evident that the United States persists in its intentions to reinstate a mechanism for monitoring Cuba, since the terms of the special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Cuba ended with the defeat of the anti-Cuba resolution in 1998. The subsequent versions, forcibly imposed by the United States in Geneva, have not managed to include that aspect.

U.S. efforts to condemn Cuba in Geneva have involved important officials in the current Republican administration. There have been conversations in New York and Geneva, letters and phone calls, and the subject has been handled crudely in every contact in Washington and certain Latin American capitals.

Everyone agrees that the pressure from the North has accelerated. As part of these maneuvers, it has been announced that on March 23 and 24, President George W. Bush will visit El Salvador and Peru. There is information that he plans to utilize those visits, during which he will have the opportunity to meet with several Latin American dignitaries, to try to commit them to voting against Cuba, and to distance them from the spirit of cooperation and sisterhood that should unite the Latin American peoples at this time. Cuba is keeping tabs, with special interest, on the preparations and possible results of those meetings.

This campaign is taking place at a time when the Latin American countries are more vulnerable to the United States; when the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) is being negotiated; when the Andean countries are hoping to extend the preferential tariff agreement they enjoy with the United States; when there are Latin American countries anxious to establish bilateral economic agreements with the United States; when critical situations, aggravated by the international crisis, exist in our region, like the one in Argentina, which require massive assistance from the international financial institutions totally controlled by the United States.

Meanwhile, the government of the Czech Republic, reaffirming its willingness to sell out and subordinate itself, has sent a delegation to several Latin American countries, imploring them to promise to liberate the Czechs from the burden of sponsoring the anti-Cuba measure imposed by the United States.

Pavel Vosalik, deputy foreign minister for multilateral affairs; Peter Burianek, an official in the Czech president’s office; and Pavel Fischer, head of the Cuba Department at the Czech embassy, make up the delegation that has visited Mexico, Peru and Chile.

We have also learned that if the United States fails in its efforts to find a new country or group of countries willing to sponsor the resolution, the Czech Republic would agree to present the resolution once again.

This year, for the first time in that organization’s history, the United States is not a member of the Human Rights Commission, given that it was not elected to that body in 2001, as a direct consequence of the international community’s discontent with U.S. positions and actions in the sphere of human rights, particularly in regard to Cuba, and in other international forums.

Cuba feels that there is no legitimate motive for selectively including this question on the HRC agenda. Any resolution or initiative, even if its text is "sweetened up," as some have requested, unjustly singles out Cuba in the Commission’s work and can only be interpreted as a response to the United States’ urgent need to find some "justification" for its policy of hostility and blockade against Cuba.

There should not be the slightest doubt that the Cuban people are preparing for this battle, in which they are backed by the force of reason and the experience gained from more than four decades of struggle.

We know that we can count on the Latin American peoples’ solidarity, generated by Cuba’s determination to defend its identity and independence, the equality for which we struggle daily, and the full and true enjoyment of all human rights – which today, thanks to the Revolution, have become achievements that all our people are committed to defending.

The document Cuba wasn’t supposed to know about, the contacts made on the highest levels in Washington with Latin American governments, and the Czech delegation’s visits to Latin America clearly reveal the growing desperation, like that of previous years, perceived in the State Department corridors.