Photo:  Estudios Revolución.

Havana, November 11 (RHC)-- Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel ratified his country's permanent vocation of solidarity with Ibero-American Secretary General Andrés Allamand Zavala, whom he received Friday at the Palace of the Revolution.

The head of the Ibero-American General Secretariat -SEGIB-, is in Havana as part of the celebration of the VI Conference on International Cooperation of the Association of Caribbean States -AEC-, which ended today.

Díaz-Canel reiterated to the dignitary the importance Cuba attaches to the Ibero-American Conference, to the work being carried out by this mechanism for political coordination and cooperation, which was created within the framework of the First Summit of Heads of State and Government in July 1991 in Guadalajara, Mexico.

This meeting allows us -- he pointed out -- to give continuity to the relations we have within the Ibero-American platform, because for us it is very important everything that the Ibero-American Conference has been doing, which has allowed in more than 30 years of work the development of projects that have benefited the member countries from inclusion.

"The Ibero-American Conference has been a totally inclusive organization, which does not clash with the internal affairs of the countries, which has created a favorable environment for cooperation, for debate."

"And I believe -he added later- that we are at a moment in which we have to focus our efforts on cooperation, especially on how our countries can recover from the pandemic tragedy of recent times".

The Head of State expressed his gratitude for the support our country has received from the majority of the Ibero-American community in the resolution that year after year he presents at the UN on the need to put an end to the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States of America on Cuba, and which this year was voted for the thirtieth time.

He also acknowledged the Ibero-American Secretary General for his presence and interest in attending the 6th ACS Cooperation Conference. This will allow us, he said, to enable our Caribbean brothers and sisters who are not part of the Ibero-American community to participate in joint projects and thus enhance the possibilities that the Caribbean has in terms of cooperation.

The Ibero-American Secretary General thanked the Cuban President for the meeting. Cuba -he said- is for us a major player in the Ibero-American community. We "greatly value Cuba's commitment to the Ibero-American community, the contributions it makes in different areas, its participation in different cooperation instances, the contributions it often makes in a very significant way to the adoption of resolutions.

"As you know, the Ibero-American community works on the basis of horizontality, consensus, unanimity, and obtaining and adopting these resolutions in these critical times is sometimes difficult, but Cuba always makes a very significant contribution".

We -he later pointed out- "are absolutely at Cuba's disposal for those things we can do", Allamand Zavala emphasized.

"Our idea is, after the Ibero-American Summit in Santo Domingo, between March 24 and 25 -and I take this opportunity to tell you that we hope to count on your presence, for us it is very important that Cuba is with its President of the Republic-, to carry out a very interactive process, a consultation system, to look at the globe of what is being done in terms of cooperation, to see what new things we can do in the future".

The Ibero-American General Secretariat (SEGIB) is the international organization created by the Santa Cruz de la Sierra Agreement (May 2004) to support the 22 countries that make up the Ibero-American community (the 19 Spanish and Portuguese-speaking countries of Latin America, and those of the Iberian Peninsula, Spain, Portugal and Andorra).

As explained on its website (www.segib.org), the institution supports the organization of Ibero-American Summits of Heads of State and Government, fulfills their mandates and promotes Ibero-American cooperation in the fields of education, social cohesion and culture. It is the only official space for convergence, work, follow-up and agreements in the Ibero-American region that brings together countries on both sides of the Atlantic.

The meeting between the Cuban President, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, and the Ibero-American Secretary General, the Chilean Andrés Allamand Zavala, was attended by Carlos Blasco Bernaldez, Chief of Cabinet of the Ibero-American Secretary General; and Martín Rivero Illa, Coordinator of the Ibero-American Space for Social Cohesion and South-South Cooperation of the SEGIB.