HAVANA, Cuba.- The first Cuban and Latin American cosmonaut, Brigade Gen. Arnaldo Tamayo Mendez, received on Wednesday the Friendship Order of the Russian Federation from the hands of the Vice President of the State Duma of that country, Ivan Melnikov, who is in Havana heading a parliamentary delegation at the invitation of the Cuban National Assembly (Parliament).

During the ceremony, in the presence of the president of the Cuban Parliament, Ricardo Alarcon, Melnikov said the award was being granted following instructions of Russian president Dimitry Medvedev for Tamayo’s contribution to the development of relations between the two countries.

He added that the occasion served to mark important dates such as the 50th anniversaries of the first manned flight into outer space by Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin on April 12, 1961, and of Cuba’s victory against the U.S.-backed mercenary invasion of Bay of Pigs.

The Russian official highlighted the bonds of friendship that have existed between the two nations since the triumph of the Cuban Revolution, when the people of the former Soviet Union supported Cuba, in words and actions, when the U.S. imperialism was trying to destroy the newly-born Revolution.

Upon receiving the award, Tamayo said he accepted it on behalf of the Cuban people and noted that the Cuba-Russia Friendship Parliamentary Group and the Cuba-Russia Friendship Association are “strong mainstays of the important work of solidarity with our Russian brothers.”

Also present in the ceremony was the Russian ambassador to Havana, Mikhail Kamynin and the Russian parliamentary delegation that accompanies Melnikov, as well as the vice minister of the Ministry of the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces, Army Corps Gen. Joaquin Quinta Sola, and the vice president of the Cuban Parliament, Jaime Crombet.