Cuba 2019 Constitution

Title I. Political Foundations

Chapter I. Fundamental Principles of the Nation

Article 1

Cuba is a democratic, independent and sovereign socialist State of law and social justice, organized by all and for the good of all, as an indivisible and unitary republic, founded by the labor, dignity, humanism, and ethic of its citizens for the enjoyment of liberty, equity, justice, and equality, solidarity, and individual and collective well-being and prosperity.

Article 2

The name of the Cuban State is the Republic of Cuba, the official language is Spanish, and the capital is Havana.

The national symbols are the flag of the lone star, the Bayamo Anthem, and the coat of arms of the royal palm.

The law defines the characteristics that identify them, their use, and their conservation.

Article 3

In the Republic of Cuba, sovereignty resides nontransferably with the people, from which all of the State’s power emanates. The people exercise this power directly and via Assemblies of People’s Power and other organs of the State that are derived from them, in the form and according to the norms established by the Constitution and the laws.

Article 4

The defense of our socialist homeland is the greatest honor and the supreme duty of every Cuban.

Treason is the most serious of crimes, whoever should commit treason will be subject to the most severe sanctions.

The socialist system that this Constitution supports is irrevocable.

Citizens have the right to combat through any means, including armed combat when other means are not available, against any that intend to topple the political, social, and economic order established by this Constitution.

Article 5

The Communist Party of Cuba, unique, Martiano, Fidelista, and Marxist-Leninist, the organized vanguard of the Cuban nation, sustained in its democratic character as well as its permanent linkage to the people, is the superior driving force of the society and the State.

It organizes and orients the communal forces towards the construction of socialism and its progress toward a communist society. It works to preserve and to fortify the patriotic unity of the Cuban people and to develop ethic, moral, and civic values.

Article 6

The Union of Young Communists, a vanguard organization of the Cuban youth, is recognized and supported by the State, contributes to the education of the youth in the revolutionary principles as well as the ethics of our society, and promotes their active participation in the edification of socialism.

Article 7

The Constitution is the supreme norm of the State. All are obliged to comply with it. The orders and acts of the organs of the State, their leaders, functionaries, and employees will act in conformity with that which is prescribed by the Constitution.

Article 8

That which is prescribed in international treaties that are in force for the Republic of Cuba constitute or form part of national legislative regulations, as applicable. The Constitution of the Republic of Cuba takes priority over international treaties.

Article 9

All are obligated to strictly adhere to socialist law.

Furthermore, the organs of the State, their leaders, functionaries, and employees ensure its respect in the lives of all people and act within the limits of their respective responsibilities.

Article 10

The organs of the State, its leaders, functionaries, and employees are obligated to respect, care for, and respond to the people, to maintain close links with the people, and to submit to their oversight in the forms established by the Constitution and the laws.

Article 11

The State exercises its sovereignty and jurisdiction:

1. Over the entire national territory, comprised of the Island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, the other adjacent islands and cays, the interior waters, and the extended maritime territories established by the law, the aerospace that extends over these territories, and the radio spectrum;
2. Over the environment and the natural resources of the country;
3. Over the natural resources, both living and nonliving, of the waters, the seabed, the waters above it, and the subsoil of the sea within the Republic’s exclusive economic zones according to the territorial extensions set by the law and in accordance with International Law, and
4. Over the continental shelf as far as the law prescribes and in accordance with International Law.

Likewise, the State exercises jurisdiction in the contiguous zone that corresponds to International Law.

Article 12

The Republic of Cuba repudiates and considers illegal and void the treaties, concessions, or pacts agreed to under conditions of inequality or that alienate or diminish its sovereignty or territorial integrity.

Article 13

The State’s essential objectives include the following:

1. To channel the efforts of the nation in the construction of socialism and to strengthen national unity;
2. The maintain and to defend the independence, integrity, and the sovereignty of our homeland;
3. To preserve national security;
4. To guarantee effective equality in the enjoyment and exercise of rights, and in compliance with the duties enshrined in the Constitution and the laws;
5. To promote sustainable development that secures individual and collective prosperity, and to obtain greater levels of equity and social justice, as well as to preserve and to multiply the achievements of the Revolution;
6. To guarantee the dignity of people and their integral development;
7. To strengthen and preserve the ideology and the ethics inherent to our socialist society;
8. To protect the natural, historical, and cultural patrimony of the nation, and
9. To secure the educational, scientific, technical, and cultural development of the country.

Article 14

The State recognizes and stimulates the social and mass organizations that bring together distinct sectors of the population, that represent their specific interests and that involve them in the tasks that edify, consolidate, and defend the socialist society.

The law establishes the general principles that these organizations are based upon and recognizes the practice of other associative forms.

Article 15

The State recognizes, respects, and guarantees religious liberty.

The Republic of Cuba is secular. In the Republic of Cuba, the religious institutions and fraternal associations are separate from the State and they all have the same rights and duties.

Distinct beliefs and religions enjoy equal consideration.

Chapter II. International Relations

Article 16

The Republic of Cuba bases its international relations on the exercise of its sovereignty as well as on the antiimperialist and internationalist principles in accordance with the interests of the people and, in consequence:

1. Reaffirms that economic, diplomatic, and political relations with any other State may never be negotiated under the force of aggression, threat, or coercion;
2. Ratifies its aspiration for a dignified, true, and valid peace for all states, based on the respect for independence and sovereignty of the people and their right to free determination, expressed in the liberty to choose their political, social, economic, and cultural system as an essential condition to secure peaceful coexistence between nations;
3. Sustains the will to observe, without restrictions, the principles and norms that constitute international law, in particular the equality of laws, territorial integrity, the independence of states, the nonuse of threats of force in international relations, international cooperation for mutual and equal benefit and interest, the peaceful resolution of controversies on the basis of equality, respect, and the other principles proclaimed in the United Nations Charter;
4. Reaffirms its will to integrate and collaborate with the countries of Latin American and the Caribbean;
5. Promotes the unity of all Third-World countries and condemns imperialism, fascism, colonialism, neocolonialism, and other forms of subjugation in any of its manifestations;
6. Promotes the protection and conservation of the environment as well as responding to climate change, which threatens the survival of the human species, through the recognition of common, yet differential, responsibilities; the establishment of a more just and equitable international economic order as well as the eradication of irrational patterns of production and consumption;
7. Defends and protects the enjoyment of human rights and repudiates any manifestation of racism or discrimination;
8. Condemns direct or indirect intervention in the internal or external affairs of any State and, therefore, also condemns armed aggression, any form of political or economic coercion, unilateral blockades that violate International Law, or any other type of interference or threat to the integrity of the States;
9. Rejects the violation of the non-renounceable and sovereign right of all States to regulate the use of and the benefits from telecommunications within their territory, according to universal practices and to the international agreements to which Cuba belongs;
10. Classifies wars of aggression or conquest as an international crime, recognize the legitimacy of battles of national liberation and armed resistance to aggression, and considers it our international duty to act with solidarity with the assaulted party and with the people who fight for their liberation and self-determination;
11. Promotes complete and general disarmament and rejects the existence, proliferation, or use of nuclear weapons, weapons of mass destruction or those with similar effects, as well as the development and use of new weapons, including autonomous weapons and new forms of waging war, such as cyberwarfare, that transgress International Law;
12. Repudiates and condemns terrorism in any of its manifestations, in particular, State terrorism;
13. Ratifies our commitment to the construction of a society of information and knowledge centered on the people and oriented towards sustainable development, in which all may create, consult, utilize, and share information and knowledge in order to improve their quality of life; and defends the cooperation of all states and the democratization of cyberspace, and condemns its use and the use of the radio spectrum for purposes contrary to those purposes stated above, including the subversion and destabilization of sovereign nations;
14. Bases its relationships with countries that edify socialism on fraternal friendship, cooperation, and mutual assistance;
15. Maintains and fosters friendly relations with countries that, despite having a different political, social, and economic system, respect our sovereignty, observe the norms of coexistence between States, and adopt a reciprocal attitude with our country, in accordance with the principles of International Law, and
16. Promotes multilateralism and multipolarity in international relations, as alternatives to the domination and political, financial, and military hegemony or any other manifestation that threatens peace, independence, and the sovereignty of peoples.

Article 17

The Republic of Cuba may concede asylum, in accordance with the law, to those who are persecuted because of their ideals or their fights for national liberation, progressive activities, socialism and peace, democratic rights and its assertions, as well as to those who fight against imperialism, fascism, colonialism, neocolonialism, and any other form of domination, discrimination, or racism.