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Cuba
Baseball Win Aids Katrina Loss
In a welcoming ceremony for
Cuban baseball players coming in
second place at the World
Baseball Classic (WBC),
President Fidel Castro
reiterated the island will
donate the prize money to US
victims of Hurricane Katrina.
"We are ready to donate that
money to Hurricane Katrina
victims," he said. The US had
refused a Cuban offer to send
for free a team of disaster
physicians immediately after the
storm.
Members of Cuban baseball team
attending the WBC return this
Wednesday to their respective
provinces, a day after arriving
in Havana, where the people gave
them a huge warm welcome.
The Cuban team finished second
in this tournament, defeated by
Japan 10-6 in the final game,
but beat powerful teams from
Panama, Venezuela, Puerto Rico
and the Dominican Republic.
Fidel Castro also slammed
Washington´s economic blockade
on Cuba for almost 50 years,
which bars the island from
having income originating in the
US.
Initially, the Bush
Administration had banned the
Cuban team from attending the
Classic under the argument it
would obtain proceeds from the
tournament and that was against
the blockade.
Then, the Cuban Baseball
Federation responded that it
would donate any earnings to the
victims of Hurricane Katrina,
thus neutralizing Bush´s claim.
The Cuban president expressed
thanks for support from other
countries like Panama, Puerto
Rico, Venezuela and Dominican
Republic. He also thanked the
tournament´s organizers for
having invited Cuba.
Fidel also praised "the position
of Cuban baseball players, who
stayed cool in the face of
provocations by a small
counterrevolutionary group," in
San Juan, capital of Puerto
Rico.
In another moment of his speech,
the Cuban leader stated that the
WBC achieved a victory over the
unfair exclusion of this sport
in the 2012 London Olympic
Games, by showing that it is
indeed a world sport.
Fidel Castro said the same
amount of money the baseball
team did not receive for their
performance in the WBC will be
earmarked by this government to
the Cuban Baseball Federation to
continue developing this sport
in the island.
The leader closed by saying that
none of baseballers or their
relatives will want for anything
to have a comfortable decent
life.
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