I have been to Cuba many times. I have spoken many times with Fidel Castro and got to know Commander Ernesto Guevara well enough. I know Cuba's leaders and their struggle. It has been difficult to overcome the blockade. But the reality in Cuba is very different from that in Chile. Cuba came from a dictatorship, and I arrived at the presidency after being senator for 25 years.

Every country has its own reality and its own leaders, and the leaders act in accordance with their reality.

I have often said that it doesn't matter to me if a student tells me he is a leader of the left, unless he is a good student. We need good students.

Chile is a country that sells cheap and buys expensive, because we have to pay for manufactured goods from countries at much higher levels of development.

This is an instrument in the hands of the people for fighting the fascist saboteurs, because the Chilean armed forces are a guarantee of constitutionality and integrity.

I have experience and I am employing it in the service of a Chilean road for Chile's problems. We always take advantage of experience wherever it comes from, but adapting it to our reality. I am putting it to use in a Chilean way, for the problems of Chile. We are not anyone's mental colonists.

I have always said to workers that they have to work hard, to produce more and better. In Chile, we need to achieve an average annual income of US$2,000, and to do that we need to increase production.