Cuba is our friend, not our enemy, Cheryl LaBash, NNOC co-chair, told Prensa Latina in a message on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the assaults on both Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes barracks.

The heroic deed on July 26, 1953, made the Cuban national resistance movement (M-26-7) against U.S.-backed Fulgencio Batista´s dictatorship much stronger, LaBash stressed.

Young leader Fidel Castro and other revolutionaries were imprisoned, “and some tortured and killed with U.S. weapons”, she added.

Since “the triumph of the Cuban Revolution, the United States has relentlessly attacked Cuba’s sovereignty and security.”

In order to reach its goal, the US government has been using the “stifling blockade, media warfare, covert destabilization programs, military aggression and illegal occupation of a portion of Cuban territory in Guantanamo Bay”.

LaBash recalled that “from Eisenhower and Kennedy, to Obama, Trump and Biden, every U.S. president has kept these cruel policies opposed by the majority of the American people and in violation of international law.”

This July 26, National Rebellion Day, NNOC is celebrating this anniversary with you in Santiago de Cuba, she said.

Our members and friends of Cuba across the United States – from California to Texas, Colorado, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Maine, and major cities like Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston, New York and Miami – and around the world mark this day and this week with actions of love.

We feel respect for the vision of a better world that is not only possible but necessary, she emphasized.

pll/jha/dfm