Photo: Omara García Mederos. Havana Tribune.

Havana, Feb 9 (RHC) Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel attended the opening of the 31st Havana International Book Fair on Thursday, in the Nicolás Guillén Hall of the San Carlos de la Cabaña Fortress.

The opening of the event, which will be held until March 19 with Colombia as a guest of honor, took place in one of the main venues of the event.  

Together with Colombia's Vice-President Francia Marquez and Patricia Ariza, Colombia's Minister of Culture, the Cuban president joined the literary festival that defends Marti's maxim "Reading is Growing".

The members of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba, the vice president of the Republic, Salvador Valdés Mesa, and Esteban Lazo, president of the National Assembly of People's Power, were also present at the opening ceremony.

As announced by the Cuban Foreign Ministry on the social network Twitter, the meeting coincides with the fact that our country holds the annual presidency of the G77 plus China, and has a stand on the subject located in Hall 10 of Pavilion A of the aforementioned location.

For the first time, Havana assumes this annual responsibility, with the will to work on the common objectives of the countries that make up this bloc of political coordination, which brings together 134 of the 193 members of the UN, adds the tweet from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Likewise, the presence of the Head of State at the Fair shows the support of the government of the largest of the Antilles to this great program, which is also evidenced by the print run of 4.2 million copies and the strategy of keeping the prices of the volumes subsidized.

In its 31st edition, the event pays tribute to Fina García and Antonio Núñez Jiménez on the 100th anniversary of their births, while praising the trajectory of bibliographer Araceli García Carranza and writer Julio Travieso Serrano, winner of the 2021 National Literature Prize.

As usual, the event hosts publishing houses, writers, booksellers, and promoters from 40 countries and a representation of 120 Cuban and foreign exhibitors, who are part of the varied agenda of conferences, panels, colloquiums, literary presentations, business rounds, and artistic activities. (Source: Prensa Latina).