REPORT BY MAJOR RAUL CASTRO ON ACTIVITIES OF ANIBAL ESCALANTE GROUP
[Continued from last week. ]
@ Approaching foreigners
(This section is very important.)
Anibal Escalante made several attempts to spread to countries abroad the differences that his group had with the Party line, and to that end he took advantage of contacts that he had with foreigners, briefing as to information that should be given them and making attempts to travel to the USSR and other countries where he could explain his position.
When Dr. Emilio de Quesada was appointed to travel to a medical congress in Europe together with Dr. Alonso, at the end of 1966, Quesada received orientation from Anibal Escalante to speak with a Soviet woman, Galia Dubroskaia, member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union or the Komsomol, and take her a letter of introduction, with the intention of expressing the group's divergences from the Party line. Galia had served as Anibal Escalante's interpreter during his stay in the Soviet Union. The interview took place, and Quesada maintained close relations with her during his) stay in Moscow.
Moreover, Quesada requested and received permission to stay in Czechoslovakia for several days, an opportunity he used to speak with Dr. Frantisek Kriegel, member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia.
Anibal Escalante had been consulted concerning this interview and the way in which the opinions of the group should be presented to Kriegel.
The interview took place as arranged, and Quesada gave a full report of the problems and how they viewed the situation in Cuba.
Kriegel sent word to Anibal Escalante that "If the internal situation was that way, he (Escalante) must be careful, as they might kill him." :
Dr. Kriegel had been in Cuba as adviser to the Ministry of Health and had met Quesada there.
In addition, several commissions from the Party of the German Democratic Republic visited Cuba in 1966 in order to. help set.up a printing press for our Party, responsibility for which had been assigned to Octavio Fernandez (in custody) by the Commission for Revolutionary Orientation (COR). The first of these groups, which arrived in July 1966, included Paul Hockart, Hohamnes Kogler and
Manfred Linke.
Octavio Fernandez carried on con-
versations mainly with Hockart (the head
of the group), to whom he presented the
points of view held by the group, con-
trary to the line of the Party.
Hockart offered to work very hard
to insure good results, so that "a Commu-
nist will triumph in his job" and also
promised to send Octavio Fernandez an
invitation to the Leipzig Fair, stating
that, once there, he could present his
points of view in more detail.
This delegation left, and in
September 1966 another arrived which in-
cluded Hohamnes Kogler, Manfred Linke
and Somerman. Kogler, as head of the
group brought a letter for Octavio Fer-
nandez in which Hockart told Octavio
that he could have complete confidence
in Hohamnes in regard to any problem
whatsoever.
Octavio Fernandez was instructed
by Anibal Escalante to explain their
points of discrepancy to this group as
he had to the first. Anibal was also in
favor of holding a meeting with these
Germans, and a date was set, but the
meeting did not take place because they
were unable to find an interpreter they
believed they could trust.
Later Hohamnes Kogler took Octavio
Fernandez to his embassy for an interview
with Karlheinz Mobus, the GDR consul at
that time. There he explained the group's
views in greater detail, and the invita-
tion for Octavio to visit the Leipzig
Fair was repeated.
Before this delegation left Cuba
Hohamnes told Octavio that any problem
could be entrusted to the GDR commercial
adviser in Cuba, Otto Schreiber. Fernan-
dez had several interviews with Schreiber
covering a number of questions, including
what they chose to call "the French loan
to Cuba and economic and political ties
with that country."
Octavio Fernandez invited the
technicians to visit La Corona Cigar
Factory, where they were received by the
administrator and Renay Hernandez (in
custody), union secretary of the factory
at that time. After the visit, Octavio,
Renay and the Germans left together and
discussed their viewpoints.
@ Contacts with a journalist
from the Soviet Union
Shortly prior to the OLAS (Latin-
American Organization of Solidarity) Con-
ference, Octavio Fernandez met Vadim
Lestov, a Soviet journalist, at the entrance of the Party's Central Committee headquarters. Lestov told him that he was going to the USSR and would return to Cuba after the 50th anniversary celebrations.
Octavio Fernandez informed Anibal Escalante of this meeting, and Escalante suggested that he see this Soviet journalist and tell him of what was happening, such as the dismissal of former PSP menbers, the replacement of Armando Acosta, economic problems, the problem of the labor movement, the anti-Soviet trend, and relations with France, and, in addition, that an invitation be sought for Anibal and his wife to visit the USSR, where, under the pretext of looking into matters of poultry genetics, Anibal hinself would present the situation in the Soviet Union.
Octavio Fernandez, together with Inaudi Kindelan, visited the Soviet journalist in the Riomar Building, where he lived, and discussed all of the points indicated by Anibal Escalante, including his need to visit the USSR to present his views and under what circumstances he wished to go. Vadim Lestov stated that, although he would see that the information and the request reached the director of the newspaper Izvestia, who is an alternate member of the Central Committee of the CPSU, it was preferable that a written report be prepared and signed by Anibal Escalante, Octavio Fernandez and Inaudi Kindelan. He insisted that the report be presented in writing because various opinions existed in the USSR concerning the problems they were presenting and, for example, the Soviet Ambassador in Cuba, Alexander Alexeiev, did not share these views, so that this could appear to be a personal matter brought up by him; and, therefore, a written report signed by them was necessary.
When Octavio Fernandez told Anibal Escalante of the results of this interview and that the written report must be submitted to Vadim Lestov that same evening, or early the next morning at the airport, before his departure for the Soviet Union, Escalante objected to having to prepare a document to present these views and also criticized Octavio for having included Kindelan in the interview. Anibal had each one's functions very compartmentalized and apparently did not have sufficient confidence in Kindelan. That is, when Anibal learned that he must sign something, he began to invent obstacles, as Octavio realized when Anibal told him that he (Octavio) should be the one to sign.
Nevertheless, he agreed to help prepare the document by dictating the major points to be dealt with to Octavio, who was to type it on another typewriter
-- one that was not Anibal's. Octavio
took the notes to the ice cream factory
managed by Rail Fajardo Escalona (in
custody), who gave him permission to
type the report there. He began to work,
but, because of the hour -- workers were
beginning to arrive in the office, which
made the job difficult -- and because of
the danger and seriousness of preparing
such a report -- in addition to the fact
that Anibal had sent him off to do it
without himself being willing to sign
it -- Octavio Fernandez decided not to
prepare the document. He went to his
home and burned the notes.
When he informed Anibal Escalante
that he had not delivered the document
because of lack of time, Anibal told him
not to worry about it any more, that he
would make the arrangements himself.
(As I stated previously, Octavio
had burned the document for the reasons
given.
@e Lack of loyalty _to
Party_and country
During interrogation Octavio Fer-
nandez Bonis (in custody) reconstructed
the document dictated by Anibal. Its con-
tent is extremely interesting, since it
reveals with absolute clarity the ideas
and aims -- as well as the absolute lack
of loyalty to the Party and their country
-- of the accused. They were the same
opinions that Anibal tried to get to the
Soviet leadership by every possible means,
in a shameless attempt to obtain their
support and bring about their interference
in matters which are incumbent only and
exclusively upon our people and our Party.
In essence, and according to Octavio's
version, the document dictated to him by
Anibal to be delivered to Lestov, who,
in turn, was to have it reach the director
of Izvestia, read as follows:
"With De Gaulle's new attitude in
France after his failures in Vietnam and
Algeria, appearing before the world with
the same past-century slogan of ‘liberty,
legality (sic) and fraternity' and adopt-
ing a correct attitude of peaceful coex-
istence, of free trade with all countries,
even of tactical confrontation with Yankee
imperialism, although strategically co-
inciding with it because of their class
position, a new trend has been set in
motion in our country, stimulated by a
credit extended by France in an effort
to draw us closer politically as well.
"With this aim in view, a series
of activities, both cultural and social,
have been organized -- the Salon de Mai,
tourist groups, etc. -- thus permitting a
rapprochement between groups. This group
is headed by Llanusa, Marcelo Fernandez,
Alfredo Guevara and Carlos Franqui. Logi-
cally, this is in keeping with the policy
of drawing us farther and farther away from the Soviet Union.
"Recently, the book Revolution in the Revolution? by Régis Debray was es—tablished as study material for Party nuclei. Debray was expelled from the Communist Youth of France under suspicion of being a member of the French Intelligence Service. His book fails to recognize the Party's role and that of the working class in the struggle for power.
"In keeping with this policy of publishing new material and ignoring the manuals and other books containing certain experiences -- philosophical as well as economic -- the Editora Politica was eradicated, and a new organization, The Book Institute, was created to publish books which do not express fully Marxist concepts.
"Promotion of Party cadres is being carried out among comrades of petty-— bourgeois rather than proletarian extraction, so that all Party work reflects concepts and methods which are alien to the working class.
"Party candidates are asked their opinion concerning the USSR in order to determine whether or not they sympathize with it. If the answer is affirmative, discussions are held with the comrade to maxe certain problems clear to hin.
"This policy has, of course, led to the gradual replacement of long-time Communists, because their position is considered pro-Soviet.
"In Latin America we find ourselves practically divorced from the great majority of Communist Parties as a result of our opinion on how the struggle should be carried out. This may cause us serious problems with regard to solidarity toward our Revolution and unity of action against imperialisn.
@ Twisted reports on our economy "Our economy at present is running at a deficit. The sugarcane harvest this year, after six months, reached the figure of 6,100,000 tons -- making it an unprofitable harvest. The difficulty was lack of cane and organization.
"So far as the prospects of our having a sugarcane harvest of 10 million tons by 1970 are concerned, this is very doubtful, since measures for increasing the industrial capacity of installations are not being put into practice at a pace appropriate to this end; moreover, there is another serious problem that we must face: the cutting of cane will not be conclusively solved by the cane conditioning centers.
"As may be observed, to judge from the present size of our sugarcane crop, the years that remain and the difficulties we have met, it will be almost impossible to reach 10 million tons by 1970.
"Therefore, our economy in 1970 will not be able to reach the levels necessary to achieve an adequate solution for the country's problems.
"With respect to production in general," continues the report, which, according to Octavio, the three were going to send to the Central Committee of the CPSU, "it, too, is below the levels required to meet the needs of the people. The policy applied through all production lines is based on a budgetary system which rests on moral incentives, absolutely setting aside material incentives, failing to recognize the laws of social development.
"This whole situation of not applying self-financing and, therefore, material incentives, has caused a slackening of production. Voluntary work is resorted to to meet the goals of production, and this, when it doesn't produce enough to meet costs, results in production of inferior quality.
"The role of the trade unions in this stage of the building of socialism is overlooked. They have been practically stripped of their role in production, completely underestimating the aid that they can give us as a leadership organization of the working class, helping to plan and organize production, develop socialist emulation and see to it that the workers constantly educate themselves politically and culturally."
The report continues: "This underestimation of the workers is reflected not only here but also in the workers' dining rooms, whose food value index is low. All this results in a general malaise in the working class."
These were the fundamental ideas that Anibal wanted to send to the Soviet leadership, according to the testimony given by one of his closest collaborators.
e Interview with
a Soviet adviser
Later, Anibal, intent on his purpose, met with a Soviet adviser of the Ministry of the Interior with whom he was acquainted. The Soviet adviser expressed annoyance with a note from the Revolutionary Government, which appeared in the press, concerning the 200-mile limit arbitrarily established by the reactionary military Government of Argentina with the aim of obstructing the operations of Cuba's fishing fleet. The adviser was of the opinion that the note was damaging to the
interests of the USSR, and he tried to explain his country's position in paying the fines levied by the Argentine Government. The conversation passed to other international problems; the Cuban and Soviet positions were discussed, and Anibal presented the viewpoints expressed in the aforementioned document.
The adviser asked Anibal if he had discussed these viewpoints in Moscow and if he were willing to do so. Anibal asked him, if such an interest in the matter existed, to please arrange passage to the Soviet Union for him and his wife, as this would be a good opportunity for him to present his viewpoints.
During his interrogation, on Decem~ ber 10, 1967, Anibal declared that he had met Pedro, who was later named adviser to the Cuban Intelligence Service, at the 19th Congress of the CPSU and that the first time he saw him after the triumph of the Revolution was around November 7, 1965, anniversary of the October Revolution, at a dinner at Pedro's house to which he -- Anibal -- had been invited. He declared that he attended the dinner accompanied by his wife and that at no time during the visit did any conversation take place on his opinions or the policy of the Revolution.
On that occasion Anibal invited Pedro to lunch with him as a gesture of reciprocity.
Some time later, Pedro visited Anibal at his farm, and, from there, the two men and their wives went to lunch ata country restaurant -- where, again, there was no conversation of a political nature.
@ Conversation with
the new adviser
Later -- although the exact date has not been determined -- Pedro telephoned Anibal, inviting him to his home for a farewell dinner, since he was leaving the country. (That is, Pedro had finished his job here, he was ready to leave, and he invited Anibal to his house for dinner.) Anibal declared that he attended the dinner without asking if other guests would be present and that Pedro didn't say whether or not anyone else would be present -- but that at the dinner (such a coincidence!) he met numerous Soviet citizens, among them the new adviser, Pedro's replacement, who proved to be the husband of a classmate of Anibal's daughter in the Moscow Conservatory of Music.
On one occasion, when Anibal was already long involved in all these maneuvers, Comrade Manuel Pifieiro, Vice- Minister of the Interior, happened to drive by the Soviet Embassy, and, seeing his Ministry's adviser leaning on an automobile and engaged in conversation
with someone inside the car, he decided
to play a joke and brought his car to a
sudden stop beside the parked automobile.
To his great surprise and the embarrass-
ment of the adviser, Pifieiro saw that the
téte-a-téte was between none other than
Anibal Escalante and his own adviser.
Anibal declared that he saw the
adviser again when he -- Anibal -- went
to pick up his grandson at the children's
nursery of the Soviet Embassy. It was
then the adviser invited Anibal to a
farewell dinner because he, too, was
leaving Cuba. (Thus, each adviser put
Anibal in touch with the next.
Anibal does not remember this ad-
viser's name. (Although he believes that
this man held an official position of
less importance than Pedro's and showed
that effect, thus indicating that they
must have discussed a great deal of
politics.
Anibal attended the dinner alone,
and there the conversation dealt with
Anibal's political opinions and other
themes of interntational politics...
(Anibal has a grandson in the So-
viet Embassy's children's nursery. On
that occasion we checked on it, because
I_spoke with the Ambassador and with the
chief of the advisers at the Ministry of
the Interior. The latter was quite of-
fended, because he believed Pifieiro should
have told him about it.
(I_said to him: "You're practically
suggesting that I have Pifieiro arrested
for not showing respect for you, a I
don't intend to do such a thing." And I
made it Clear to him: "We are Pifieiro's
superiors, not you." This was said in a
most fraternal tone but also with firm-
ness.
(He said to me: "How can you pos-
sibly_ believe that we...?" and I replied:
"We don't believe anything, but if you
weren't so obtuse about this you'd inter-
pret it as a warning, and it would be very
painful for us to find some Soviet offi-
cial here -- diplomatic or not -- involved
in matters of an internal character.")
(We already had other indications.)
On August 29, 1967, a letter writ-
ten by Anibal Escalante and addressed to
Comrade Armando Hart was received at the
Central Committee In this letter Anibal
requested authorization to travel to the
USSR, Czechoslovakia and Hungary to do
research work on poultry genetics.
(He_ had failed in his efforts with
the journalist as well as with Pedro,
Pifieiro's adviser, and now he was approach-
carry_out his trip.)
Anibal had already sent a message -- via a student -- to Galia Dubroskaia asking her to arrange a trip to the USSR by ship. (Another try.)
On the occasion of the Latin American Journalists' Seminar, the Dominican journalist José Amado Camillo visited our country and established contact with Yolanda Pulido, Anibal Escalante's former secretary, who now works for the TASS agency, and asked her to arrange a meeting with Anibal. The meeting took place at Yolanda Pulido's home. It lasted for more than two hours, and at its end Anibal Escalante advised the Dominican to send Dominican Communist Party material and other things not to his house but to Yolanda Pulido's.
Other contacts were made between the microfaction and foreign elements, always with the same purpose, to get their points of view known abroad and seek support for their positions.
In this connection a document was seized from Ricardo Bofill Pagés (in custody), former head of the Publicity Department of the State Fruit Growing Enterprise, which totally distorted the history of the struggle against the tyranny, sustained the infamous accusation that the old Communists were being persecuted, and reiterated the all-too-familiar charlatanry about the bourgeois extraction of the leaders of the Revolution and the existing anti-Sovietisn.
The document was found hidden under a seat in Bofill's automobile. He had promised to deliver it to a Soviet citizen within a few days, but his arrest frustrated the plan.
The Soviet citizen to whom Bofill was to deliver the document was Mikhail Roy, a journalist of the Novosti agency, now in Cuba. The same man had also made contact with Edmigio Lépez Castillo (in custody) so as to request information on Comrade Garcia Pel&ez, who had recently been appointed Ambassador to the USSR. For this purpose, Lépez Castillo approached Octavio Fernandez, who worked at the COR and could furnish more detailed information.
The three of them met on a street corner in Vedado and went for a long ride in the automobile owned by the Soviet journalist. During the ride, Octavio Fernandez gave Mikhail Roy whatever information he had concerning Comrade Garcia Pelaez. Roy asked Fernandez if he thought Garcia Pelaez was anti-Soviet and if his appointment was due to a change in Cuba- USSR policy.
Later Octavio Fernandez told Anibal about the meeting.
(If_you want to ask a person some ordinary questions, you invite him to your house or you go to his house, to his office, or here or there; _but when you're involved in conspiratorial activities, both persons involved utilizing the classic intelligence method to gather information, you make a date on a street corner, you_are picked up, you go for a long, slow ride to Santa Fe -- as in this case ~- and then are dropped off somewhere else.
Edmigio Lépez Castillo kmew Rudolf P. Shliapnikov, known as Rodolfo, who held the post of Second Secretary in the Soviet Embassy. On one occasion, when Rudolf and Edmigio Lépez Castillo, his brother Ricardo, and José Antonio Caballero were holding a meeting in Edmigio's house, Félix Fleitas and Alfredo Batista -- all microfactional elements -—arrived and joined in the conversation, criticizing the revolutionary leadership.
Félix Fleitas said that he had been trying to get in touch with the others for quite some time to learn their opinion on the existing policy, and that there were old-time Communists in Cuba who wished to seek asylum in the Soviet Embassy. Rodolfo, the Second Secretary of the Soviet Embassy, interrupted hin, saying that that was not the way, that it was necessary to wait.
e@ Looking for protest
from abroad
In this conversation Félix Fleitas also said that the long-time Communists would never betray the USSR, since they agreed with its positions; that the Soviets had to do something here because the situation was very bad, and that they ought to protest about the policy of criticizing the USSR that had prevailed in recent speeches.
"Rodolfo" -- that is, Rudolf P. Shliapnikov ~- explained to them that if they, the Soviets, were to send a note to Major Fidel Castro he was capable of publishing it, and that this was not desirable. Therefore, they couldn't do anything, for then the same things would be said to the Soviets here as to the Yankees.
Fleitas told Shliapnikov that Cuba intended to buy petroleum, and Rudolf told him that it must be the petroleum of Leoni; Fleitas added -- jokingly -- that it seemed that Cuba was thinking of breaking with the USSR.
At this, Rofolfo, joking, laughingly replied, "Look, all we have to do is tell the Cuban Government that repairs are going to be made in the port of Baku
that will last for three weeks," setting everybody off in loud laughter. It should be kept in mind that this conversation was held among microfactional elements and a Soviet official at the home of one of these elements.
There are several pages appended here relative to this interview.
At the end of November 1966 Rudolf P. Shliapnikov, "Rodolfo," was invited to an assembly at the Ministry of Labor. He was invited not by any minister, but by one who will be named later.
Rudolf spoke at the assembly. At the end of the meeting Rudolf; Abel Castafio Speinler, a former organizer of the National Tobacco Workers' Union who had taken a course on trade unionism in the USSR; and José Pereda, who was Secretary General of the Young Communist League in the Ministry of Labor and had also studied in the USSR, had a talk in Pereda's office, where they drank a toast, after which Rudolf stated the following: The conditions have been created in Cuba for another Hungary; imperialism is working in an objective manner in accord with the concrete conditions of this Revolution directed fundamentally by the bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie; notice that there is great internal discontent; that it must be pointed out to this Revolution that in Hungary it was not the peasantry that suffocated the uprising, but that confusion had been very widespread and the task of confronting the situation fell to the Department of State Security and that, nevertheless, here in Cuba even this Department showed manifestations that the petty bourgeoisie was to be found even within that organism."
(As I recall, it was not precisely the Department of State Security that put down the counterrevolutionaries there. these.)
Arrialdo Escalona, Orlando Olivera, Félix Fleitas (all in custody) and Escalona's wife, Hilda Felipe, attended a luncheon with two Soviet citizens -- the captain and political commissar, respec-— tively, of a fishing vessel -- carrying forward their plan to defame the Revolution and influence the opinion of every Soviet citizen in contact with Cuba.
A Soviet citizen of Spanish origin named Rafael Garcia, who works with other Soviet technical personnel at the Fishing Terminal, served as interpreter in this conversation.
Arnaldo Escalona stated: "Look. Tell them -~ the Soviets -- that the main leaders of this Revolution and this Party do not have a Communist background. The majority were anti-Communists. The Party is rife with petty-bourgeois elements. There is a leftist adventurist deviation, and that adventurism is in command; they consider Cuba the hub of the world. From here, we give orientation to the whole world and don't accept advice from anyone, orders from anyone; but we give orders, we want to give orientation. In the 22nd éongress (all_of this in a very ironic tone), in the Party Congress of the USSR, the Cubans made speeches telling the Soviets what they had to do. We suppose that the Soviets laughed and said, "Ah! These boys! These boys!"
Orlando Olivera: "The son teaching the father. Look! the Party, because its leadership is petty bourgeois -- which doesn't mean that the Party is backed by the petty bourgeoisie. No? You understand me -- its orientation is simply nationalist, reflects a chauvinist class tendency, and that is the problem with the international line.
"The economic resources," continued Olivera, "that we have, that are obtained in dollars, are invested to subsidize, to give anti-Communist orientation throughout Latin America and on other continents, to attack the Soviet Union and the Communist Parties of every country. It is not that we hold these ideas, but recently we spoke with two members of the Central Committee of the Dominican Communist Party -- one of them is Justino del Orbe -and they told us that in their country there are two organizations that are anti-Communist but call themselves Marxist: the 14th of June Movement and the MPD."
Olivera continued: "That is, that the daily effort and sacrifice of our workers are being invested to carry out anti-Soviet and anti-Communist campaigns throughout the world. .
"The problem is that Fidel wants Cuba to be the hub of the whole world and he himself to become more important than Marx. And for that we have to invent in philosophy, we have to invent in economy, we have to invent in everything, so that he can achieve a stature greater than that of Marx, Engels and Lenin."
Arnaldo Escalona speaks again:
"I was saying that here the highest political organization in our country does not meet, and, moreover, within the Central Committee the old leaders of the Communist Party of Cuba are in total disagreement with the policy that is worked out here by one man, because here policy is made by no one but Fidel Castro; the highest organism exists but has no opportunity to discuss or express its opinions. And months go by and the former leaders of the Party don't even see Fidel. That is something that perhaps you don't know; perhaps you do. But if you don't know, I mention it so that the comrades -- that is, the Soviets -- understand the situa-
tion that exists, even within the highest political organization."
@ Members of the
microfaction praise
their "achievements"
Félix Fleitas interrupts: "Look, let me make this explanation, because I want to tell you this: Comrade Arnaldo Escalona was the revolutionaries' lawyer under the tyranny. He defended Communists as well as those from other revolutionary organizations. But because he was so well kmown he had to leave the country, because they were after him."
Escalona breaks in: "I learned this from Georgi Dimitrov's conduct during the Reichstag fire trial: when a Communist faces his judges, he must uphold his principles and fully denounce the enemy's policy."
Hilda Felipe speaks: "Well, look, I want to say that I'm the only woman at this meeting, and a woman may not always have the highest political development. But a mother knows when something is going wrong; nature has given us that instinct. And I'm very concerned, because I have the impression that at one of these meetings we're all going to be arrested. And when I say all, I refer to the long-time Communists."
Arnaldo Escalona interrupts: "Look, during the war I worked with a group that fought here in Havana, and that was a dangerous task then. For example, we trans-
ported bombs, went to the Sierra, hid peo-
ple, did things for which we could have
lost our lives. The comrades know me,
they know all this. And I wasn't as con-
cerned when I faced the Batista army as
I am now, because I don't know who I'm
facing. And the feeling we have is shared
by all the members of the old Party."
(I_would like to know what bombs
he transported and what persons he took
up_to the Sierra or about any other dan-
gerous activities he engaged in, asid
from defending some prisoners. Neverthe-
Tess, he considers himself a disciple of
Georgi Dimitrov.
Fleitas speaks: "In March 1962
Anibal Escalante went through a political
crisis in Cuba, and we consider that
since that time the worki class has
been stripped of power. Anibal Escalante
went to the Soviet Union, and now he is
in Cuba. This comrade is the revolution-
ary leader whom the long-time militants
consider one of the firmest in the strug-
gle for giving power to the proletariat,
for the proletariat to assume power,
alongside the Soviet Union; he is the
one who encourages many of us Communists
at this time, encourages us to remain
firm in our principles," concludes
Fleitas.
(This data suffices to illustrate
the shameful activities of these elements
in connection with persons in other coun-
tries.
(To be continued. J