Truemors
81-year-old Fidel Castro has officially announced his retirement from the Cuban presidency. His 76-year-old brother Raul is expected to take over.
For the full text of the resignation letter, click here.
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HAVANA (AP) — An ailing, 81-year-old Fidel Castro resigned as Cuba’s president today after nearly a half-century in power, saying he will not accept a new term when parliament meets Sunday.
The end of Castro’s rule — the longest in the world for a head of government — frees his 76-year-old brother Raul to implement reforms he has hinted at since taking over as acting president when Fidel Castro fell ill in July 2006. President Bush said he hopes the resignation signals the beginning of a democratic transition.
“My wishes have always been to discharge my duties to my last breath,” Castro wrote in a letter published today in the online edition of the Communist Party daily Granma. But, he wrote, “it would be a betrayal to my conscience to accept a responsibility requiring more mobility and dedication than I am physically able to offer.”
In the pre-dawn hours, most Cubans were unaware of Castro’s message. Havana’s streets were quiet, and there was no movement at several party-run neighborhood watch groups in Old Havana. It wasn’t until 5 a.m., several hours after Castro’s message was posted on the internet, that official radio began reading the missive to early risers.
Castro temporarily ceded his powers to his brother on July 31, 2006, when he announced that he had undergone intestinal surgery. Since then, the elder Castro has not been seen in public, appearing only sporadically in official photographs and videotapes and publishing dense essays about mostly international themes as his younger brother has consolidated his rule.
This is a photo of Alina Fernandez Revuelta [Fidel Castro's Daughter] while working as a Volunteer Chemist in the Department of Research and Pathology in the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Miami Florida.
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