HAVANA.- Cuba commemorates today the 57th anniversary of the founding of the largest mass organization in the country, known as the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR).

On September 28, 1960, the then prime minister, Fidel Castro, called for the creation of the organization, which now groups more than seven million people over the age of 14.

In front of the former Presidential Palace, now the Revolutionary Museum, the historical leader of the Cuban Revolution pointed out the main threats to the social, economic, political and cultural project that began on January 1, 1959.

'We are going to establish a system of collective revolutionary vigilance,' he told the nearly one million people who gathered that day.

The location and dismantling of elements that were intended to support the brigade of defeated mercenaries at Playa Girón in April 1961 was one of the first actions of the CDR.

The CDRs are organized from the neighborhoods of each municipality and province of the Caribbean island. Mobilizing Cuban society in tasks to defend the Revolution has been a constant of this popular organization, although over the years it has also assumed numerous other social missions.

The event for the 57 anniversary of the CDR will be in Pinar Del Río province, located at the western end of the island.

'Pinar del Río is a territory with a deep tradition of CDR work, which every year exhibits satisfactory results,' said the national coordinator of the organization, Carlos Miranda.