[NYTr] Text of Cuban 5's Birthday Greetings to Fidel

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[The five Cuban anti-terrorist political prisoners in US jails sent
the following messages to President Fidel Castro in recognition of
his 81st birthday on August 13th. Rene Gonzalez, one of the Five, who
are considered national heroes in Cuba (and in many other places)
shares an August 13th birthday with Fidel. His message from 2006 apears
last. The Five's next court date is at the Atlanta Appeals Court on
August 20, when their endless case continues with more arguments. -NY
Transfer]


Agencia Cubana de Noticias (ACN)
http://ainch.ain.cu/mailman/listinfo/ingles


Birthday Greetings to Fidel from the Cuban Five

 From the Lineage of the Titans

August 6, 2007

Dear Fidel:

This year has gone by with great optimism and joy knowing your virtuous 
daily battle for life and your full recovery. We are profoundly proud 
to have a commander from the lineage of the titans, of those who never 
abandon battles, who never relinquish their dreams. You are our best 
guide and example.

On this 81st birthday we wish you good health and vitality, and many 
more birthdays that we can celebrate together in our beautiful country.

Receive the eternal embrace of the Cuban Five and all of our affections 
and best wishes.

Happy Birthday Comandante!

Ramon Labañino Salazar
U.S.P. Beaumont, Texas, USA


Convinced that Victory Will Come

Dear Commander in Chief:

Here is my warm birthday greeting and I send you my embrace on this 
August 13th.

I hope that the happiness I wish you multiplies as I also enjoy knowing 
of your recovery.

One year ago today, after learning of the adverse decision by the 
judges in our case, and despite your delicate health, you wrote a note 
to us assuring that we will win over this monstrous injustice.

On the 39th minute of the first hour of your birthday, from your sick 
bed and with your own handwriting, you wrote us that perennial 
conviction in victory that characterizes you.

Your gesture will always be engraved in my consciousness as a 
revolutionary Cuban, as one of the many personal reasons why you will 
always be our Commander in Chief.

Happy Birthday!

Fernando Gonzalez Llort
Federal Correction Center
Oxford, Wisconsin, USA



Your ideas are the essence of our people

Dear Fidel:

Happy Birthday from a prison of the empire where I always have you in 
my heart.

For some reason, August has been a month of important happenings in the 
legal battle against the monstrous injustice that keeps us in prison. 
We can say, in an almost poetic style, that the case proceeds "at the 
pace of August," a slow pace, if you take into account that our direct 
appeal hasn't even been concluded in five years of arguments, analysis 
and rulings.

On this coming August 20 another oral hearing takes place before a 
panel of judges of the Appeals Court of Atlanta. There, we are 
confident, that once again our truth "will take justice to a place 
where the greed of men can't reach it." We don't know when a ruling 
will come from the panel, but I can reaffirm that the five of us are 
firm and calm; at the level of our people, ready to face anything with 
the conviction in a final victory as we were taught by Che.

We receive your Reflections and we read them carefully and with 
pleasure. They educate us, guide us and strengthen us. They have shown 
us the process of your recovery and that you are at the head of our 
colossal and transcendental Battle of Ideas.

On a daily basis we also receive numerous letters of encouragement and 
support from our beloved country and all corners of the planet. In 
reading what children, university students, workers, CDR members, 
civilian collaborators abroad and the people in general, as well as 
friends of Cuba in the world have to say, we strongly feel in our 
hearts the complete certainty of your warning to the Empire: "You will 
never have Cuba!"

The just ideas that you, commander in chief, have taught us each day 
will never die. They are the essence of an entire heroic and invincible 
people.

Long Live the Revolution!

Here's a big revolutionary embrace,

Antonio Guerrero Rodriguez

July 28, 2007
Florence, Colorado Penitentiary



Happy Coincidence

"Having a birthday on August 13, of course, by chance, a one in 365 
probability that took place despite the family legend that la Vieja (my 
mother) wanted to hold on until the 14th because in the United States 
being born on the 13th, as I was born, is considered bad luck.

"Later, chance became something fortunate to me, something that I 
became gradually aware, as I learned that it was my birthday and later 
discovering that it was also Fidel's. As time went on, more people 
around me made me took note of it.

"I remember the military unit I was in when Fidel turned 50, and we 
wrote a collective letter and when we signed our names; my comrades 
wished me a happy 20th birthday, a beautiful experience I will never 
forget.

"In the end, the birth my mother couldn't hold back for 15 more minutes 
before the first bell of August 14 became a coincidence that for me is 
a commitment, for all that Fidel represents and as a revolutionary 
Cuban to have been born on the same day as him is a satisfaction and is 
a constant motivation to be better."


That's how Rene Gonzalez Sehwerert described the coincidence of being 
born on the same day, August 13, as our Commander in Chief, in a 
statement published in Granma last year. Rene, who is serving an unjust 
sentence in the Marianna, Florida prison, turns 51 today.