Radio Cadena Agramonte emisiora de Camagüey
Havana, Oct. 10 – One week from its end, the Vietnam Red Cross's support campaign for Cuba, launched last August, has achieved significant results, according to statistics released today in Hanoi.
Since its launch on August 13, the initiative has received more than two million individual and collective contributions totaling approximately 523 billion dong (more than $19.8 million dollars at the current exchange rate), both through the bank account set up for this purpose and through the Red Cross system in provinces and cities.
This humanitarian initiative demonstrates the solidarity, loyalty and firmness of the Vietnamese people with the brotherly people of Cuba, said in a press conference the undersecretary of the Communist Party Committee (PCV, for its acronym in Spanish) of the Vietnam Fatherland Front and central organizations, Nguyen Thai Hoc.
The party leader, quoted by the newspaper Juventud, emphasized that the program, developed under the theme "65 Years of Vietnam-Cuba Friendship," reached its initial goal of raising 65 billion dong in just 30 hours and doubled that goal in 48 hours, raising 130 billion VND.
For his part, the acting president of the Vietnam Red Cross, Nguyen Hai Anh, emphasized that this short-term campaign has achieved the largest scale and number of participants ever developed, with nearly 2.2 million people supporting it.
On its Facebook page, the organization noted that the number of donors is more than two million, but the heart belongs to millions of Vietnamese people, because a transfer sometimes involves the help of agencies, organizations, and companies, in which many people contribute with a small part, sending love to the Cuban people.
Another post from the humanitarian organization also emphasized that, even as the country faces the consequences of devastating floods, "the Vietnamese always know how to share, because the intention, kindness, and spirit of helping oneself have never faded."
The campaign, which was launched by the Vietnamese Red Cross on August 13th, on the occasion of the 99th birthday of the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, and in the context of the Vietnam-Cuba Friendship Year and the 65th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations, will conclude on the 16th.
On that occasion, Do Van Chien, member of the PCV Political Bureau and president of the Vietnam Fatherland Front, emphasized that this action demonstrates the Vietnamese people's tradition of humanity and the deep friendship that exists between the two nations.
The program not only seeks to provide material support to overcome the immediate difficulties Cuba is facing, but also to powerfully spread a message of empathy and international solidarity, Van Chien noted, reiterating that, under any circumstance, the Vietnamese people always stand by the Cuban people.
This -he stressed- is a traditional connection of affection that extends for 65 years and in which fraternal affection has overcome all geographical distances and economic conditions to become an enduring spiritual value. (Text and photo: Granma Digital)
