Hanoi -The 7th Asia-Pacific Regional Meeting of Solidarity with Cuba will begin today in the Philippine capital, Manila, with the participation of around 120 delegates from 18 countries that will debate issues regarding the current situation in the Caribbean country, organizers confirmed.

Dedicated to the historic leader of the Cuban revolution, Fidel Castro, the meeting sessions will develop during the weekend, with a program that includes the work by commissions, Cuba's delegation members told the news agency Prensa Latina.

The first session will deal with the role of friendship organizations in the international campaign to put an end to the economic, trade and financial blockade of Cuba and the return of the territory occupied by the US naval base in Guantanamo.

The second meeting will be focused on the strategies to strengthen the movement of solidarity with Cuba through the alternative media and dissemination of the truth about the political, socioeconomic and cultural situation in Cuba.

The deliberations and statements in the meeting in the Philippine capital will be summed up in a final statement, which will become a guide for the work in the next stage.

For the opening session, they have planned speeches by the president of the meeting's Organizing Committee and the Philippines-Cuba Friendship Association, Francisco Nemenzo, by a representative for the government of the host country and journalist and writer Marta Rojas, the head of the delegation for the Cuban Institute of Friendship with the Peoples.

This delegation is also composed of the president of the latter authority, Alicia Corredera, and official Yexenia Calzado, as well as Ambassador Ibete Fernandez.