CLARIFICATION NOTE FROM DR. FIDEL CASTRO RUZ,

PRESIDENT OF CUBA. MONTERREY, MARCH 21, 2002.

Mr. President:

I would need twenty seconds for a point of clarification.

Excellencies:

I ask for your indulgence since I will not be able to accompany you any longer. A special situation created by my participation in this Summit obligates me to immediately return to my country.

The leader of the Cuban delegation will then be comrade Ricardo Alarcón de Quesada, Speaker of the National Assembly of People’s Power, and a restless combatant in defense of the rights of the Third World peoples. I entrust him with the prerogatives corresponding to me as a Head of State attending this conference.

I hope he will not be prevented from attending any official function that it is his right to participate in as the Leader of the Cuban delegation and the President of the Supreme body of power in the Cuban state.

Thank you, again.