The China International Development Cooperation Agency reports that on July 12, senior "government officials and scholars from more than 110 countries and 30 international organizations gathered in Beijing at the second High-Level Conference of the Forum on Global Action for Shared Development on Friday, where they highly praised China's Global Development Initiative (GDI), saying that it's bringing a new model of sustainable development cooperation that better aligns with the interests and demands of Global South countries."
We have translated the message from the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, to the opening segment of the Second High-Level Meeting of the Forum on Global Action for Shared Development:
On behalf of Cuba, I sincerely thank the China International Development Cooperation Agency for its invitation to join in this Second High-level Meeting of the Forum on Global Action for Shared Development, which is being held in Beijing.
This is a formidable platform to promote development as the central axis of the system of international relations and for the agreement between our nations on the most effective ways to reduce inequality gaps and advance in the effective achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
As we all painfully know, sustainable development is a chimera for the vast majority of nations. With only six years to go before the deadline set for the fulfilment of the 2030 Agenda, it is clear that, at the current rate, none of the 17 proposed goals will be achieved and more than half of the 169 agreed targets will be breached.
In the current turbulent global scenario, all developing nations have had to face the contraction of our economies, under the enormous weight of foreign debt, the disruption of supply chains, the exorbitant increase in prices and freight, food insecurity, as well as the growth of poverty levels, derived from an unjust international order that is anti-democratic and exclusionary.
In Latin America and the Caribbean, the situation is more alarming. The region is the most unequal on the planet, with about a third of its population living in poverty.
Cuba is a case apart. After more than six decades facing the rigors of the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the Government of the United States, we are going through the hard and uncertain post-pandemic period, beset by a suffocating intensification of this criminal policy, with measures specially designed to frustrate development plans and further harm our people.
Particularly harmful to the country's efforts to move forward is the absurd inclusion of Cuba in a spurious list of states that allegedly sponsor terrorism, a unilateral and unsubstantiated action with which the U.S. government has constantly sustained and multiplied the effects of its aggressive policy.
Numerous governments and political and social forces around the world have joined the international call to correct this grave injustice, in a gesture of genuine and valuable solidarity for which we are grateful.
Despite the abusive obstacles of the criminal blockade that we have cited, the implementation of the 2030 Agenda has been a high-priority commitment for Cuba from the beginning. To achieve this, the National Economic and Social Development Plan until 2030 was designed and is being implemented, aimed at achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in their three dimensions: economic, social and environmental.
Distinguished guests,
We sincerely believe that the Global Development Initiative, proposed by President Xi Jinping in 2021, shows a new paradigm of sustainable development cooperation more in line with the legitimate interests and aspirations of the Global South.
At an early date, Cuba welcomed the initiative because it considered it inclusive and coherent and in line with the need to design and promote a new just and equitable international order. That is why we have supported its positioning as a priority issue for the international agenda through the Group of Friends of the Global Development Initiative at the United Nations, the Group of 77 and China and in other multilateral spaces.
China's efforts to maintain an active international cooperation agenda and, even in the midst of difficult contemporary challenges, to make funds available and implement projects with a high socioeconomic impact, which contribute directly to the effective implementation of the 2030 Agenda, are commendable and deserve the highest recognition at the global level.
It is with this conviction that Cuba reiterates its deep gratitude to China for its sustained support and permanent solidarity, which has been fundamental and decisive for the implementation of projects and access to technologies that directly benefit our people.
Dear guests,
No one disputes that the efforts of developing nations are not enough to implement the 2030 Agenda and that it is imperative that developed countries fulfill their historic commitments in this area.
The genuine development aspirations of the South call us to act together in inclusive frameworks such as the Global Development Initiative.
I associate myself with the words of President Xi Jinping recently on the occasion of the Commemorative Conference for the 70th Anniversary of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, and call on all parties to cooperate for the future of humankind and the well-being of peoples.
Success to the Forum, for which I have already predicted the best results!
Thanks very much.
This was translated and the image was used via a License CC-BY-NC
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