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The Cuban population decreased by 1,889 in 2007 for the second year in a row, despite a slight increase in the birth rate, the National Statistics Office (ONE) reported.

According to the report “Demographic Indicators. Cuba and its Territories”, published on the ONE website, the Cuban population decreased from 11,239,043 to 11,237,154.

Although the number of births increased in relation to 2006, the combination of deaths and migrants tilted the balance towards a decreasing tendency, according to the ONE.

The ONE’s predictions are not encouraging, as the Cuban population is expected to decrease by 26,000 by 2020.

Meanwhile, demographic aging increased, as 16.2 percent of the Cuban population is over 60 years of age, compared to 15.9 percent in 2006.

After the demographic boom in the 1960s and 1970s, when an average of 250,000 children were born, Cuba’s population began to decrease in the 1990s, and that tendency persists.

According to Cuban demographic authorities, that tendency is similar to the one reported in developed countries, and has resulted from Cubans’ high educational level and the economic crisis that affected the country in the 1990s.

Cuban CDRs - Committees in Defense of the Revolution - the massive grassroots Cuban organization (more than eight million members) highlighted Sunday President Fidel Castro´s moral stature.

In a message published by Juventud Rebelde newspaper, the CDR National Executive office expressed that the president, who has dedicated his life to fulfilling his duties, is giving us a new lesson in moral stature, bravery, unselfishness and confidence.

The CDRs supported Fidel Castro´s decision to not accept the position of president of the Council of State or Commander in Chief, at the 7th National Assembly legislature beginning today.

To our adversaries, the moment might seem suited for confirmations and aspirations, reads the CDR statement, pointing out that revolutionary surveillance will be an insuperable defense against any enemy attempt.

For the Committees in Defense of the Revolution, this is the time to maintain the unity that has so far preserved the most dearly and beloved wishes and sacred aspirations of this nation throughout history.

Over half a million citizens of 16 countries currently use the Cuban method “Yes, I can” to learn to read and write.

Up to now, a total of two million 160 thousand persons in nations of three continents have benefited from the method created by Cuban professor Leonela Ines Relys Diaz, reported the Agencia de Informacion Nacional (AIN) quoting Cuban education officials.

The Cuban literacy program is now being applied in Venezuela, Paraguay, Argentina, Mexico, Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil, Peru, Honduras, Nicaragua, Dominican Republic, New Zealand, Mozambique, El Salvador, Colombia and Guinea Bissau.

In Grenada, Ecuatorial Guinea, South Africa, French Guiana, Timor Leste and Haiti authorities are working to apply the method to reduce illiteracy in just 65 days with the help of TV and video equipment.

The method originally written in Spanish, has been translated into Portuguese, English, Creole, Quechua, Aymara and other languages.

Venezuela, the first to massively apply the Cuban method, was declared free of illiteracy on October 28, 2005, second in Latin America after Cuba which achieved such a feat in 1961, when over 1.5 million of its citizens learned to read and write.

According to the United Nations Education, Science and Culture Organization (UNESCO), about 861 million persons, that is 20 percent of all the planet´s adults, are illiterate. Of that figure, two thirds are women.

Also, 113 million children do not attend school and lack access to basic education.

For that reason, the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution that establishes a Decade of Adult Literacy from 2003 to 2012, in order to boost world efforts to reduce the high and persistent indicators of illiteracy, to which Cuba contributes modestly with its experience.

Cuba urged the UN Human Rights Council’s working group on mercenaries to visit the United States, which recruits such elements to carry out deadly missions against the Cuban people.

Cuba´s Rodolfo Reyes addressed the plenary meeting of the Council on the mercenary group´s report related to structural adjustment, foreign debt and the special digest on education rights.

The Cuban official urged continued monitoring of classic and traditional mercenary activity, particularly the impact on human rights of private military and security companies.

Nearly 50,000 mercenaries are presently working as contractors in support of the coalition that invaded Iraq, the latest method to back up foreign occupation and imperial conquest, he said.

This serves US hegemonic interests, and some have been direct perpetrators of the most execrable forms of torture in Abu Ghraib, recalled Reyes.

He also stressed the need to monitor terrorist anti-Cuban groups freely operating in the US, and recalled attacks on Cuban hotels by Central American mercenaries recruited by notorious terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, who bombed a Cuban civilian plane in 1976 with 73 aboard.

The US failed in its duty to extradite him to Venezuela or bring charges of terrorism against him, so Cuba considers it critical that the Council´s work group on mercenaries visit the US as soon as possible, he concluded.

Australian Communist Party Central Committee (ACP) President Hannah Middleton reiterated that organization´s solidarity with the Cuban Revolution, sources in this capital reported on Wednesday.

The Australian party leader reiterated, ton the leaders of the Organization of Solidarity with the People of Africa, Asia, and Latin America (OSPAAAL) her identification with the solidarity tasks by that organization in t he Island.

Middleton visited the OSPAAAL headquarters, accompanied by Denis Doherty, member of the PCA Central Committee and National Coordinator of the Australian Coalition against Military Bases.

Both visitors highlighted the importance of the International Meeting against Military Bases, held in Manta, Ecuador, from March 5-9.