PRESIDENT Fidel Castro affirmed that Mr. W. Bush has no morals or moral right to talk of terrorism, human rights or freedom and democracy, at the beginning of this Friday’s giant march of one million Cubans along the Havana Malecón to the U.S. Interests Section.

Fidel described the march as an act of indignant protest and a repudiation of the brutal and heartless measures proposed by the Bush administration.

The leader of the revolution emphasized that Cubans have not come together in a hostile gesture toward the U.S. people whose ethical roots are well understood.

He commented that he knew in advance what Bush would think of those participating in the march: “In his estimation they are the oppressed masses desirous of freedom, but what he is unaware of is that the dignified and active people who have resisted the hostility and the blockade of the strongest power on earth cannot be dragged along like sheep by any force.”

“A statesman would say that throughout history just ideas have demonstrated themselves to be more powerful than force,” Fidel noted, and reflected how every epoch has had its good and bad ideas, which have all accumulated, but that the stage in which we are living in a barbaric, uncivilized and globalized world is the most shady and uncertain.

He added that in the world that Bush wants to impose today there is not the least notion of ethics, credibility, standards of justice, humanitarian sentiment or principles of solidarity and generosity.

The Cuban president stressed that everything written on human rights in the world of Bush and that of his allies is a monumental lie, and in that context recalled that that thousands of millions of human beings are living in subhuman conditions, moreover, without the most minimum knowledge to comprehend the tragedy in which they are living.

He also spoke of the millions of people who die every year of hunger and disease “in this idyllic Eden of dreams that is Earth,” and the accelerated rate at which hydrocarbons are being squandered.

The president stated that the objective of his words was not to offend Bush, but as it is he who has come up with the idea of intimidating and terrorizing Cuba, of destroying its economic and social system, its independence and its very physical existence, he considered it his duty to remind him of certain truths.

“You have neither the morals or the moral right to speak of freedom, democracy and human rights when you boast sufficient power to destroy humanity, when you have ignored the United Nations, when you violate the rights of any country and engage in wars of conquest in order to seize resources.”

The head of state emphasized that neither can Bush mention the word democracy because his ascent to the presidency was fraudulent; nor can he talk of freedom because he does not conceive of any other world than one ruled by terror.

Fidel stated that Bush has branded a dictatorship the economic and political system that has led the people of Cuba to the highest levels of literacy, knowledge and culture; that has an infant mortality rate that is inferior to that of the United States and receives free of charge educational, health and other services of great social and human significance.

The president observed that it is laughable to listen to Bush speaking of human rights in Cuba, a country where in 45 years of Revolution there has not been one act of torture, one disappeared person, death squads, extra-judicial executions or governors who have become millionaires.

He reiterated that Bush lacks the moral authority to speak of Cuba and affirmed that he is attacking this country for ignoble political reasons in search of electoral support from a group of renegades, mercenaries, former Batista supporters and their descendents.

“Nor does he have the morals to talk of terrorism,” he continued, “because he is surrounded by a group of murderers who have caused the death of thousands of Cubans with acts of terrorism.”

He charged Bush with not concealing his scorn for human life because he has ordered the extra-judicial death of a secret number of persons in the world.

Fidel stated that Bush only has the right of brute force to intervene in Cuba’s affairs and proclaim a transition from one system to another.

He warned that the Cuban people could be wiped off the face of the earth, but not subjugated if subjected to the humiliating condition of being a U.S. neocolony.

He affirmed that human beings do not and cannot understand freedom within a regime of inequality like the U.S. one and recalled that the only equality in the Black ghettoes and the American Indian reservations is that of poverty and social exclusion.

Fidel charged that Bush “has decided that our die is cast,” and made his farewell like the Roman gladiators who were to fight in the circus: “Ave Caesar, we who are about to die salute you.” “But,” he assured, “in that case Bush will be thousands of kilometers away and I will be in the front line to die fighting in defense of the homeland.”