Cuban gov’t offers electrical workers to Puerto Rico

The Cuban government has offered to send four brigades of electrical workers and a fully equipped mobile hospital with 39 doctors to help in rebuilding Puerto Rico after the U.S. colony was battered by hurricanes Irma and Maria, CubaDebate reported Sept. 25.

If the U.S. government “allows us, we will be there to give a hand in whatever is necessary,” said Fernando González, president of the Cuban Institute for Friendship with the Peoples, at a meeting in Havana Sept. 23 to commemorate Grito de Lares and support Puerto Rico’s right to independence. That’s the date of the 1868 uprising by Puerto Ricans against Spanish colonialism.

“We are eternally thankful for this gesture from our Cuban friends who — in the middle of adverse circumstances and everything they are doing to recover from the effects they suffered with the passage of Hurricane Irma — have once again shown their solidarity with the struggle of the people of Puerto Rico,” said Edwin González, representative of the pro-independence Puerto Rico Mission in Cuba. “This solidarity is mutual and it will continue to be for the love and respect that our peoples historically have for each other.”

— SETH GALINSKY