US should take Cuba off terrorist list & end the blockade

Dear Editor,
Forty-seven years ago, on October 6th, 1976, one of the worse terrorist attacks in our region took place just off the island of Barbados, when seventy-three young and unsuspecting persons were destroyed by a bomb that downed the Cubana Airlines Flight 455.
Among the persons who perished on that day were eleven Guyanese, fifty-seven Cuban nationals, and five from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).
The target of that attack was the Cuban state. This was not the first time that Cuba was subjected to terrorist attacks. Almost from its inception, the Cuban state and the Cuban people were victims of terrorism from Cuban groups in the US, hosted and financed by the US Government, and from state terrorism mainly emanating from one of the most powerful covert organizations in the world, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
These acts were conducted against a small state whose peoples sought only to improve their lives and to assist others to do the same. All they want, and wanted, was to develop their country as they wish.
The Cuban nation has made a monumental contribution to our region in education (they have educated thousands of people from Asia, Africa and Latin America). The Cuban state has sent doctors to all parts of the world wherever natural disasters occur, and into countries that have insufficient medical personnel to serve their people.
Most developing countries have been victims of a terrible brain drain. Consider this one piece of information: there are more Ethiopian doctors in Chicago than in all Ethiopia.
We, in Guyana, have benefitted, and are benefitting, from Cuba in many areas, particularly in health. Cuban teachers have helped to educate thousands of others outside of Cuba. Cuba’s solidarity is legendary. It played an important role in ending the apartheid regime in South Africa, and in protecting the independence of Angola.
It is this country that has done so much to save lives, eradicate ignorance, and enhance peoples’ health that is being subjected to such great terrorism. More than that, the Cuban state and people have been subjected to an economic blockade for more than sixty years. The blockade has cost that nation billions of dollars in trade, and has created huge problems and suffering for the Cuban people.
To now compound the illegal attacks, the United States has placed Cuba on a list, accusing it of being sponsors of terrorism. This has given the USA the excuse to impose more hardships on Cuba. How ironic, how immoral, is this!
Cuba has done more than most to bring relief to other peoples. Even up to recently, the Cuban people, in very adverse conditions, developed vaccines to fight the COVID-19 virus, and shared it with others. What generosity! What selflessness!
The time has come to take Cuba off the US terrorist list, and to lift the economic blockade from that island. The time has come to end the suffering of the Cuban people! Following up on the Nov 3, 2022 vote by 185 nations of the UN, calling for an end to the US embargo on Cuba, the UN Secretary General, on Sept 19, repeated the call.
The people of our region must call on the U.S. to take Cuba off of its terrorist list, and abandon the oppressive blockade. Cuba has done a lot to fight terrorism, why continue to punish its people? Justice demands that it be taken off the terrorist list. It is humanitarian to demand that Cuba be taken off the terrorist list. (Those who perished in the Cubana disaster cry out for this).
Allow Cuba to breathe and develop to its full potential in its own chosen path.

Sincerely,
Donald Ramotar,
Former President
of Guyana