By Collective, Rafael Bernabe
April 2, 2026
CADTM
publishes the talk given by Rafael Bernabe, former senator and member of
Socialist Democracy, during the 5th plenary session of the anti-fascist and
anti-imperialist conference in Porto Alegre
Summary
· Solidarity with Cuba
· Against all imperialisms
The Puerto Rican people have been a colony of American
imperialism for nearly 130 years. They have been and remain a people deprived
of the political power needed to make crucial decisions that affect their
lives, with an economy unilaterally specialized and controlled by foreign
capital, a colonial economy that has never generated enough jobs for its
workforce, which has caused a considerable part of the population to emigrate.
For over a century, there has been free movement of goods, money, capital, and
people between Puerto Rico and the United States. These are the conditions
that, according to neoliberal theorists, were supposed to lead to the catching
up of lagging countries with advanced countries. Puerto Rico is the living
refutation of this neoliberal dogma: after 126 years, we have a poverty rate
three times higher than that of the United States and an income per capita
equal to that of the poorest half of their states.
One aspect of the colonial relationship has been the
military use of our territory. In the past, the facilities in Puerto Rico were
used to attack Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Grenada, Central America, among
other peoples. Our fight against these abuses is being reborn today in the
resistance against the remilitarization of Puerto Rico, which is part of the
United States' military deployment in the Caribbean. Poor thing.
Solidarity
with Cuba
Puerto Rico has a special brotherhood with Cuba. We
were the last Spanish colonies in America. We fought together against Spanish
colonialism and for the confederation of the Antilles. Both our countries were
occupied by the United States in 1898. No one has been more supportive of
Puerto Rico's independence than Cuba. Solidarity with Cuba is a duty for us and
should be a central focus of the anti-imperialist struggle today.This struggle
has also shown that our ruling classes lack anti-imperialist will.
To face imperialism, we therefore need a united front
of the working classes and all oppressed sectors, fully independent from the
bourgeoisie and its institutions. This independence should also extend to
so-called progressive governments. Today, we see them hesitate to support Cuba,
waiting for Trump's authorization to send oil. Don’t they see that by allowing
Cuba's independence to be undone, they are setting up the undoing of whatever
remains of their own independence; that what imperialism is doing to Cuba
today, it will do to them tomorrow. Cuba needs fuel, and we must demand that
governments able to provide it do so immediately, regardless of Trump’s
tightening of the blockade.
This united front is just as necessary to face fascism
and the far right. Today, we see how different sectors think to neutralize the
far right by adopting parts of its rhetoric. We can't trust these classes that
either can't or won't confront the dangers threatening us. We need to build
movements that, starting from the most urgent popular concerns, lead to
questioning private control of production. The crisis of capitalist
civilization (economic, political, ecological, climatic) raises both the
possibility and the need to link the antifascist and anti-imperialist struggle
to the need to go beyond capitalism.
Against
all imperialisms
Comrades, our direct struggle against Yankee
imperialism and colonialism in Puerto Rico doesn’t stop us from recognizing
that there are other forms of imperialism and other capitalist powers eager to
secure zones of control and influence. That there are other repressive and
anti-worker governments, beyond the allies of Yankee imperialism.
We denounce the genocide in Gaza and the aggressions
of Yankee imperialism in America, its blockade of Cuba, its claims to conquer
Greenland and to regain the Panama Canal, its brutal war against Iran. We
condemn the repression in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and
other countries against those who protest the genocide in Palestine. We support
the struggle for the independence of the Sahrawi people, whose representative
is here with us at this table.
Against the invasion of Ukraine by Russian
imperialism, in solidarity with those opposing this invasion, against
aggression toward Iran while supporting the Iranian people against the
theocratic regime
But we also denounce the invasion of Ukraine by the
Russian Federation and the repression in Russia of opponents to this invasion.
And, while protesting against the aggression towards Iran, we stood in
solidarity with the struggle of the masses against the authoritarian and
theocratic regime in that country.
We know the arguments that are sometimes made against
what we have laid out. That Putin is reacting to NATO's encirclement. But the
reality is that Putin is reacting, in any case, with his own imperialist
aggression, which we cannot support. It's telling that this aggression is
accompanied by an explicit denunciation by Putin of the Leninist doctrine of
the right of nations to self-determination.
That Zelensky's government is reactionary and
right-wing, and it is, and that's why we don't support it. But that doesn't
justify the invasion ordered by Putin, nor does it take away from the
legitimacy of resisting that invasion. Imperialism does try to create
opposition to the governments it wants to overthrow. And that's true,
imperialism tries to co-opt struggles in Iran and elsewhere, but that doesn't
reduce popular struggles to imperialist manipulation.
Comrades, all imperialist powers appeal to admirable
ideals. Historically, Yankee imperialism acts in the name of freedom and
democracy. It came to our country claiming to free us from Spanish despotism.
But this is not the only deceptive policy we face. We are also confronted with
rhetoric that, in the name of multipolarity, supposed geopolitical realism,
challenging Eurocentrism, or Western capitalist democracy, attempts to justify
denying the democratic rights of the working class, women, and other groups.
Faced with this sophism, we assert that trade union
rights, freedom of speech, assembly and association, the right to strike, and
the election and recall of leaders are not 'Western values,' 'liberal models,'
or 'Eurocentric' ideals that imperialism claims to impose: these are historical
demands of the international working class. It's not about moralistic
standards, but class-based criteria. You can't really talk about anti-fascism
without defending these achievements or aspirations.
We can sum up our position in three points:
1. Rejection of all imperialisms and all occupations
2. Support for the right of all peoples to
self-determination
3. Support for the working class and oppressed sectors
in all countries.
Long live solidarity with Cuba, our big sister!
Long live the unity of peoples against fascism!
Long live the anti-imperialist struggle and for the
self-determination of peoples!
<https://www.cadtm.org/Pour-l-unite-des-peuples-contre-le-fascisme-contre-tous-les-imperialismes->
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