Nonaligned nations ponder loss of Castro

When Cuba last hosted the Nonaligned Movement summit, the Cold War still divided the world and Fidel Castro was a strapping 53-year-old inspiring armed movements in poor countries the world over.

The Cuban-inspired Sandinista rebels had just triumphed in Nicaragua, the Shah of Iran had just fallen, the U.S. still controlled the Panama Canal and wars of liberation from colonial powers raged in Africa.

To the leaders who gathered in Havana in August 1979, Castro was the symbol of their struggle for self-determination and freedom from U.S. domination.