Fidel's first visit to Vietnam

Hanoi, Nov 25 (RHC) Six years after his physical disappearance, Cubans and Vietnamese remain firm on the path of independence, sovereignty, dignity, and socialism traced by the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, said Nguyen Viet Thao today.

The permanent vice-president of the Vietnam-Cuba Friendship Association stressed that both peoples, parties, and governments have continued to cultivate the tree of brotherhood, fraternity, help, and exemplary cooperation, which is the best way to pay tribute to the Commander-in-Chief.

At a ceremony on the occasion held at the headquarters of the island's diplomatic mission in this capital, Viet Thao said that in Vietnam there is a custom of gathering at home and with the family to commemorate the anniversaries of the death of parents and grandparents.

That is why, we gather here today as brothers to remember a leader who drew the political map of the contemporary world, very different from the one written before by the colonialists and imperialists, and who is revered by the Vietnamese generation after generation, he said.

He also recalled the visit, in September 1973, of the Commander-in-Chief of the Cuban Revolution to Vietnam in the middle of the war; the first and only one made at that time by any head of state or government, he remarked before qualifying the event as the highest symbol of revolutionary internationalism.

Fidel's presence among the Vietnamese combatants was a great stimulus for the troops marching south in search of the definitive victory and even today continues to give us inspiration and strength, now in the tasks of renewal to make socialism stronger, he said.

As part of the tribute to the Cuban leader were projected fragments of a speech delivered during his first visit to this Indochinese nation in which he described the revolutions of both countries as events of historical importance and an enormous contribution to the cause of the international revolutionary movement.

We arrived here with great admiration for these people and we are leaving with even greater admiration, said the Cuban leader, who said he took with him only one sorrow: that of not having had the privilege of personally meeting President Ho Chi Minh, who died four years earlier, on September 2, 1969.

During today's ceremony, young people from the Cuban mission here said that the Commander-in-Chief died honoring his name, Fidel: worthy of faith; the faith that all his people and the great homeland placed in him and that was never betrayed by the man dressed in olive green, victor over bullets, hunger and cold.

They also recalled the heartfelt tribute paid by the people to their historic leader and the moving moment when Army General Raul Castro bid him farewell with an "Until victory always", that slogan "that so many times has saved us from the impossible and has made us stand up to continue making revolution". (Source: PL)