http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2008/marzo/mar11/Timor-Leste.html
Timor-Leste's top authorities bid farewell to Cuban medical brigade
Dili .- In a ceremony presided over by the interim president of the Republic of
Timor-Leste, Fernando Lasama de Araujo, and Deputy Prime Minister Jose L.
Guterres, along with ministers of foreign trade, Zacarias da Silva, and health,
Nelson Martins, and Cuban Ambassador Ramón Hernández Vázquez, the Democratic
Republic of Timor-Leste bade farewell to the 177 Cuban doctors and medical
personnel who have been carrying out their honorable mission in this South
Asian country for more than two years.
Some 18,000 Cuban doctors are
providing services in 73 countries
in Latin America, the Caribbean
and Africa.
The medical brigade is due to arrive in Cuba on March 13, after boarding the
same airplane that is taking another Cuban health care contingent to
Timor-Leste. Together with those that are to remain in the country, the new
brigade is comprised of 237 Cuban internationalists, plus 35 teachers who are
traveling there this month in order to continue running the national literacy
campaign, which thus far has taught 3,500 Timorese how to read and write.
In his closing remarks at the moving ceremony, where all of the Cuban
internationalists received a certificate from the country's authorities, the
Timorese head of state thanked them personally and in the name of the Timorese
people "for the effort, dedication and great help that Cuba has given us in
friendship through you. I also welcome the new cooperators who will be
arriving, and would like to use this opportunity to wish all of the Cuban
people happiness and further progress."
For his part, Health Minister Nelson Martins said: "There are many communities
that have asked us for the Cuban doctors to stay on longer, because their work
has been very good. All of the Cuban medical personnel have won the confidence
of the Timorese health professionals. I congratulate you all; the people of
Timor-Leste love you."
Translated by Granma International
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