Castro: Cuba tailors Marxism to fit its needs

Cuba's system is based on Marxist philosophy that is tailored to fit Cuba's needs according to Fidel Castro Balart-Diaz, son of Cuban President Fidel Castro.

"We are 11 million Cubans aspiring to live in freedom and dignity away from the intervention of the imperialist United States," Castro told Alternative in an interview. The bearded man dressed in modern suit and speaking fluent English came down heavily on what he called the American double-standard policy.

"The Americans control the media, computer technology and the Internet," said Castro. He also condemned the American monopoly over IT and Internet usages. "95 percent of the Windows Program is in American hands. Africa's share in world usage of Internet is 0.45 percent and Latin America's share is 2 percent," according to Castro who highlighted the hardships his country was facing with acquiring Internet technology. "You might think that in his 1984, George Orwell's Big Brother connoted communist regimes, well you must be wrong, Big Brother stood for the untrue American democracy."

Despite the American dominance of telecommunications technology, Cuba has succeeded in providing Internet access mostly to professional Cubans such as journalists, doctors, engineers, students, architects and researchers.

Castro denounced the misinformation that the US disseminates about its enemies while hiding its own violations.

"You have to keep in mind that America controls 85 percent of all news pictures (and footages) distributed around the world. America controls the media"

About the recent disagreement between his country and the European Union which came in the aftermath of the Cuban arrest of 75 dissidents, Castro described these rebels as "terrorists."

"We were the first country to denounce terrorism in post Sep. 11," he said adding that the United States has done all it can to compromise the Cuban security.

"US-backed terrorists kidnapped two of our airplanes and flew them to America." Castro said that in a separate incident, a ferry boat was kidnapped which provoked Cuban security forces to invade the boat and after some clashes, they killed some who were aboard.

Castro blamed the Americans for not leaving Cuba to live in peace.

"Upon the instigation of the US, some European countries decided to distance themselves from Cuba.

"They claim they are looking after human rights while they are the first country to violate such rights," Castro said. "Where are the rights of those imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay? Are rights of the Palestinians in the occupied territories safeguarded by the US-backed Israel?"

The Cuban official, who is the Scientific Advisor of the President of the State's Council, said that Cuba has had special relations with Arab states and has always backed the Palestinians in their struggles with the Israelis.

"We severed our ties with Israel since the 1973 Arab-Israeli war," Castro argued. Castro also said that his country eyes scientific cooperation and exchange of expertise with the Arab countries as he commended the high quality universities in this region hoping that after his more than one visit here, some cooperation would take off.