Hanoi, May 19 (RHC)-- The historic friendship between Cuba and Vietnam was made clear once again by a ceremony held in the Vietnamese capital, in which Cubans and Vietnamese honored their two great national heroes -- José Martí and Ho Chi Minh.
 
As fate would have it, Martí fell in combat on May 19, 1995 and on the same day, but five years earlier, the man who history would be recognized as the Father of the Vietnamese nation was born.

According to Prensa Latina news agency, the efforts of both of them to conquer the independence of their nations were highlighted during an act of placing floral offerings before a bust of the Cuban Apostle in a central Hanoi park.

The island's ambassador to Vietnam, Lianys Torres, stressed that despite the different realities of their lands and the geographical distance between them, José Martí and Ho Chi Minh shared ideas and principles that continue to govern the construction of more just societies in their countries.

Those ideas and principles, put into practice by the Communist Parties of the two nations, also forged a special friendship between Ho Chi Minh and the historical leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, even though they did not know each other.

For her part, Nguyen Thi Thu Giang, deputy director general of the Department of the Americas of the Vietnam Union of Friendship Associations (VUFO), recalled that it was Martí who sowed the seed of friendship between the two peoples with his chronicle "A Walk in the Land of the Anamites."

José Martí and Ho Chi Minh did not have the pleasure of seeing the work to which they dedicated their lives culminate, but their successors felt them present in each new victory and we treasure their revolutionary legacy as a valid guide for action for the present and for the future, he said.

The ceremony was attended by members of the Cuban diplomatic mission, students and workers of the island who are serving in the Indochinese nation, representatives of the Communist Party of Vietnam, members of the Vietnam-Cuba Friendship Association and Vietnamese who studied in Cuba.