On Saturday Nov. 26, Cuban media announced the death of the communist state’s founding leader FIdel Castro. Aged 90, Castro died the previous day. He is succeeded by various family members, including his brother Raul, who has been leader of Cuba since 2008.
Fidel Castro took over in the late 1950s, toppling dictator Fulgencio Batista only to install a repressive communist one-party state, described by Castro’s sister and fellow revolutionary Juanita Castro as an “an enormous prison surrounded by water.”
Leaders and people around world reacted variously to the former leader’s passing.
“We extend a hand of friendship to the Cuban people,” said U.S. President Barack Obama. “History will record and judge the enormous impact of this singular figure on the people and world around him.”
In Miami, Florida, there were celebrations among the local Cuban community. Castro’s policies resulted in the exile of about one million Cubans from the island nation, which has a population of 11.27 million.
Cuba under Castro played a major role during the Cold War, notably in the 1962 Missile Crisis, which nearly triggered a nuclear war.
While Castro is credited with improving literacy rates to 99%, and increasing the national life expectancy to 79 years, tens of thousands of Cubans were executed, many without trial, or jailed for opposing the Soviet-backed regime.
“Whatever success he achieved, he did so through a brutal dictatorship that denied freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and other basic civil liberties,” wrote Jonathan Turley, professor of law at George Washington University.
Leaders from Vietnam and China, which along with Laos are the only remaining countries that espouse communism, declared their remorse for Castro’s death. Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, stated that “While a controversial figure, both Mr. Castro’s supporters and detractors recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people who had a deep and lasting affection for ‘el Comandante.’”
American President-elect Donald Trump was one of the first leaders to make a statement on Twitter: “Fidel Castro is dead!”
“It is my hope that today marks a move away from the horrors endured for too long and toward a future in which the wonderful Cuban people finally live in the freedom they so richly deserve,” Trump said in a longer statement.
“Our administration will do all it can to ensure the Cuban people can finally begin their journey toward prosperity and liberty.”
(NTD Television)
Featured image: Cuban Americans celebrate upon hearing about the death of longtime Cuban leader Fidel Castro in the Little Havana neighborhood of Miami, Florida on November 26, 2016. Credit: Rhona Wise/AFP/Getty Images
