Fidel
Castro, leader of the Cuban Revolution dies at 90
The leader
of the movement that won Cuban independence and champion of the
Global South has died in Havana. Fidel Castro, former president and
leader of the Cuban revolution, died Friday night at age 90, Cuban
state television confirmed.
Raul Castro,
Cuba's President and Fidel Castro's brother, announced that Fidel
would be cremated on Saturday. "The commander in chief of the
Cuban revolution died 10:29pm tonight," said Castro.
Born in 1926
to a prominent landowner in Holguín Province, Cuba, Fidel went on to
lead Cuba’s revolutionary independence movement, defeating the
U.S.-backed Batista dictatorship in 1959.
Soon after
his movement took power, Fidel adopted an explicitly socialist model
of development and forged strong ties with the Soviet Union, earning
the wrath of the United States.
For the next
48 years, until resigning in 2008, Fidel led the tiny island nation
to historic levels of development, leading the world in many social
indicators including literacy and public health rates.
The success
of Cuba's revolution also meant facing down more than 50 years of a
hostile and destructive U.S. blockade, while also surviving multiple
CIA assassination attempts. Fidel and Cuba inspired a growing
decolonization movement throughout the world, one which Fidel
actively supported by creating networks of mutual aid throughout
Latin America, Africa, and the rest of the Global South.
Under
Fidel's leadership, Cuba's internationalism expanded beyond support
for liberation movements such as Nelson Mandela's African National
Congress, with the small island sending thousands of health and
education professionals across the world. Cuba's literacy program is
credited with having taught millions to read outside of Cuba, while
Cuban doctors earned even the admiration of the United States, who
recently lauded their "heroic" contribution to combatting
the Ebola outbreak in West Africa.
Fidel was
also vital in the upsurge of left-wing government in Latin America,
beginning with the election of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela in 1998.
Fidel and Chavez not only developed a famous friendship, but the two
leaders pushed for a radicalization and coordination of regional
movements which yielded left-wing victories in Ecuador, Bolivia, and
Nicaragua, along with left-leaning governments in Brazil, Uruguay and
Argentina.
The two
leaders also founded the Bolivarian Alternative for Our America, or
ALBA bloc, which promoted an alternative to neoliberal free trade.
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