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Leaders flock to Cuba for mass Castro rally
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LEADERS of Cuba’s allies and other developing countries descended on Havana yesterday for a mass rally commemorating Fidel Castro, who came into power in a 1959 revolution and ruled the island for half a century.
Castro, who ceded control to his younger brother Raul Castro a decade ago due to poor health, died last Friday at the age of 90.
For many, especially in Latin America and Africa, he was a symbol of resistance to imperialism, having ousted a US-backed dictator, and a champion of the poor.
Cuba announced nine days of mourning after his death, including the mass rally yesterday evening in Revolution Square — the same massive space where Castro once held fiery, marathon speeches.
Many leaders of Latin America, including Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and Bolivian President Evo Morales, were to attend the ceremony.
Shortly after landing in Havana on Monday night, Maduro paid tribute to Fidel’s “immortal force.” Also expected are several African leaders such as Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe and South Africa’s Jacob Zuma. Nelson Mandela, while he was still alive, repeatedly thanked Castro for his efforts in helping to weaken apartheid in South Africa.
China is sending Vice President Li Yuanchao, and yesterday in Beijing, President Xi Jinping visited the Cuban embassy to pay his condolences, saying China had lost a “close comrade and real friend”, China’s foreign ministry said.
Yet few leaders from the world’s major powers are heading to the Caribbean island, with many sending second tier officials instead to pay their respects to a man who built a Communist state on the doorstep of the United States.
Raul Castro and his top lieutenants held a private ceremony on Monday, laying white flowers in front of a portrait of the late leader dressed in military fatigues and carrying a rifle, erected in a memorial to Cuban independence hero Jose Marti in Revolution Square.
Cubans have also come forward to sign condolence books and pledges of loyalty to Castro’s socialist ideology at 1,060 tribute sites in the country.
“I signed because he was a good man, we loved him a lot, and I wanted to reaffirm my loyalty to him and his ideas,” said Arcide Ge, 56, a security guard. “He was good to everyone, he sent doctors abroad and helped the poor here.”
Today, Castro’s ashes will begin a procession east across the country toward Santiago de Cuba, where he launched the revolution. They will be laid to rest on Sunday in the city’s Santa Ifigenia cemetery, also the resting place of Marti.
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