• Said President Fidel Castro, referring to rigged and manipulated trial
                   against Cubans René González, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González,
                   Antonio Guerrero and Gerardo Hernández, imprisoned in Miami

                   BY FELIX LOPEZ (Granma Daily staff writer)

                   TWO days after the charges made by President Fidel Castro, the
                   innocence of the five patriots unjustly detained in Miami and the
                   certainty that they will return to their homeland continues to gain
                   strength, credibility and spirit in Cuba, the United States and
                   throughout the world. It could not be any other way, considering the
                   arsenal Revolution’s of proof, evidence, and morality.

                   "If they don’t rectify this, the political costs will be unpayable," Fidel
                   Castro warned U.S. leaders in his speech on Saturday, June 23. He
                   explained all the difficulties of trial which has been rigged and
                   manipulated by the heads of the anti-Cuba mafia, supported once
                   again by the U.S. administration and judicial system.

                   Drawing contrasts to those terrorist and counterrevolutionary
                   elements who cooked up the most recent anti-Cuba plot, Fidel
                   praised the dignity, patriotic convictions, intelligence and unyielding
                   spirit of the five young Cuban men who have known how to confront
                   the strongest pressures and the rigorous extremes under which they
                   have been held.

                   The speech took place in the capital’s Cotorro municipality, in the
                   presence of close and dear family of the patriots. In this same
                   location where on January 8, 1959, the Rebel Army entered Havana,
                   the leader of the Revolution stated, "The imperialists are faced a
                   difficult test. They do not want to rectify it, but there is no
                   alternative, because otherwise they will not be able to pay the
                   political and moral cost if they continue to sustain these charges."

                   After warning that the United States would lose less if it does not
                   allow itself to be swayed by pride and arrogance, Fidel explained that
                   this battle would be difficult, long, orderly and precise. "Everything in
                   its own time, every argument and evidence will be revealed in their
                   most opportune moments, but their innocence will be
                   demonstrated."

                    ‘I WILL ONLY SAY ONE THING: THEY WILL RETURN’

                   With the certainty that they will return, Fidel reflected on the
                   maneuvers of the Miami mafia with respect to the trial. "There is an
                   accusation, made eight months after the first charges, that of
                   conspiring to kill, which is something that came to their treacherous
                   minds in order to convince the public that the young men had
                   committed a crime capable of sensitizing the opinions of many
                   people in the world, including many U.S. citizens.

                   "We will make mincemeat of that accusation," Fidel asserted. He
                   added these young men are totally innocent of the charges
                   associated with the shooting down of those planes, in an incident
                   provoked 100% by the mafia, and we can prove it.

                   He argued that in the face of terrorist and fraudulent conspiracies in
                   Miami, Cuba must defend itself with intelligence, with ideas, with
                   young people’s spirit of sacrifice in the name of legitimate and
                   unrelenting defense.

                   He recalled that the government of the United States, with the mafia
                   as the intellectual author of the perfidy, kept adding on new charges
                   against the five Cubans until they invented the conspiracy to
                   assassinate, because they couldn’t prove anything from the first
                   accusations. After characterizing the charges as gross and
                   loathsome, he specified that the empire had to consider every
                   accusation carefully, because Cuba has indisputable truths.

                   Commenting on the jury’s verdict, characterizing the crimes
                   committed by the five Cubans as serious, Fidel pointed out that there
                   still exists a period of a few weeks in which the judge can make
                   decisions. However, he advised people not to harbor illusions,
                   because the pressures on her must be intense.

                   Cuba, he assured, "will remain up to date on anything said, done and
                   decided. They will have to think about every one of them. We know
                   a few things that are indisputable. They will commit many errors and
                   with every one they will lose ground..."

                   Fidel insisted that the battle for their return could take years, but that
                   the five Cubans detained for 33 months in the United States on
                   charges of espionage and other crimes will return to Cuba. "They do
                   not know the mess they have gotten themselves in, by making
                   these ridiculous accusations over issues of security and supposed
                   crimes by our fellow countrymen, who from the entrails of the
                   monster and with daily risk for their lives, protect our people."

                    THE MOST TREACHEROUS CONSPIRACY

                   In part of his speech, Fidel argued in detail his initial affirmation that
                   the country had spent the past few weeks struggling against devils.
                   After commenting on the accusations made towards Cuba of
                   supposed cyber-war aggressions against the United States and the
                   campaign of lies with respect to purchase of arms from China, he
                   expressed that this latest third conspiracy is the most treacherous. It
                   acts on the conditioned reflexes of millions of people, by talking of
                   supposed networks of spies that put U.S. security in danger.

                   With evident indignation, he highlighted that they referred to the
                   imprisoned patriots with disdain and scorn, like people who commit
                   great crimes, when in reality what they sought was to penetrate the
                   Miami terrorist groups, who enjoy the complicity and tolerance of the
                   U.S. government.

                   In the same way, he recalled that the fundamental terrorist acts of
                   the open war, brought against Cuba by the White House, the
                   ultra-right of the United States, and the Cuban-American mafia. This
                   is reason enough for our country to adopt legitimate and unrelenting
                   measures to guarantee peace and the economic, political and
                   spiritual development of our country.

                   THE QUINTET OF GIANTS

                   The historic moment, Fidel explained, reminds us of the battle fought
                   to return Elián González, the concern over the kidnapped child’s
                   health, his physical and mental life. This time, he explained, it’s not
                   about a five-year-old child, but rather of five young men, strong,
                   heroic, with profound convictions, whose minds and ideas could not
                   be changed, who did not hesitate for a minute.

                   The leader of the Revolution characterized them as a quintet of
                   giants, intelligent and cultured, and he stressed their high professional
                   level, something not discussed much in the United States, because
                   doing so would be to recognize the culture and dignity brought to the
                   people by the Revolution.

                   He announced that national and international public opinion would
                   know who these five young men are, how they think and act, and
                   how valiant they are. "And they will become examples, not only for
                   the youth and for the people of Cuba, but also for the youth and
                   people of the globe."

                   POLITICAL PRISONERS, PRISONERS OF THE EMPIRE

                   "We contend and are willing to prove that they are political prisoners,
                   prisoners of the empire," Fidel commented, while ratifying the
                   innocence of René, Fernando, Gerardo, Ramón, and Antonio, five
                   Cubans who have risked their lives not only for the protection of their
                   country, but also to save others, including U.S. citizens.

                   He indicated that this point of view could be sustained solidly,
                   "because those men have not committed any crime."

                   He especially recalled how the information received by Washington
                   from Cuba, provided by patriots living in Florida during the days just
                   before the rescue of Elián González in Miami, helped avoid tragedy.

                   He indicated how this communication alerted them about how the
                   terrorists praised the kidnapping, planned to shoot the police officers
                   in the legs and at the television cameras, in order to prevent the U.S.
                   authorities from taking the boy from the relatives’ house.

                   Fidel outlined how on a different occasion, in June 1998, there was
                   another exchange of information between the FBI and Cuban State
                   Security Department related to a letter sent to then President Bill
                   Clinton about the plans of terrorist groups, based in U.S. territory, to
                   shoot down planes in flight.

                   Fidel recognized that Clinton took the information seriously, but he
                   also published the letter, something we disagree with. Those
                   exchanges of information served to place in his hands evidence of
                   interest to them: four 320-page files on terrorist activities against
                   Cuba, eight cassettes with telephone conversations between
                   terrorists, and two hours and 40 minutes of video tapes.

                   Fidel remembered that after being impressed with the information,
                   the U.S. officials did not keep their promise of responding within two
                   weeks. "Three months later the answer arrived: the detention of our
                   five men and another five collaborators."

                   Faced with those inexplicable facts, he asked, "Why so many
                   coincidences? Why did they invent the cyber war and, almost
                   immediately after, the clandestine arms from China? Why in less than
                   three months after the FBI received the information from Cuba, did
                   the detention occur?"

                   The answers, he highlighted, also explain how an entirely political trial
                   was staged against the five detained Cubans. "They have not
                   committed any violent act. We propose, sustain and are willing to
                   prove that they are political prisoners, prisoners of the empire," he
                   reaffirmed.

                   Fidel added that the United States has never recognized having
                   political prisoners, and nevertheless it is a term that it attempts to
                   place on counterrevolutionaries sanctioned in Cuba. He also added
                   that they have never considered the Puerto Rican independence
                   fighters as political prisoners, and the latter have only committed the
                   crime of loving their homeland, their nation and their culture and
                   aspiring to ruling their own destiny, for which they have struggled
                   many years.

                   A LAND THAT BREEDS PATRIOTS

                   Towards the end of his speech, Fidel defended once again the right of
                   the Cuban people to send patriots to the United States, from where
                   a war has been waged for 42 years, encouraging invasions,
                   assassination attempts, and terrorist actions which have killed and
                   permanently injured thousands of Cubans.

                   He said that there are many people in the world disgusted by these
                   actions "and they are capable of running great risks for our country
                   without having been born in Cuba." Fidel noted that those people are
                   more than revolutionary and patriotic, because they have the dignity
                   and the honor of supporting this country against crimes, threats, and
                   blockades of all kinds.

                   Thanks to the Cuban patriots, we know the thinking and illusions of
                   the mafia, the thoughts of the current administration on the Cuban
                   Revolution, about which it is greatly mistaken. He explained that the
                   mafia is encouraged by the methods of the Bush administration, and
                   proof of that is the terrorist action planned in Miami for Havana’s
                   Tropicana cabaret, denounced by Cuba this week.

                   Among other examples, he referred to the pressures to avoid the
                   extradition of infamous terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, and spoke of
                   those who visit him in jail.

                   In analyzing the events and the campaigns launched against Cuba in
                   recent months, Fidel confessed that his most absolute conviction has
                   been reaffirmed that Cuba mistrusts very little, compared to the
                   reality of what the U.S. government does.

                   He stressed that the United States does not consider it genocidal to
                   kill people through a blockade or launch atomic bombs over the
                   Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.