HAVANA: With Fidel Castro recovering from surgery in seclusion, Cuba’s acting leader Raul Castro stepped out of his bearded brother’s long shadow here and strode the world stage.
“All of us would have liked for this welcome to come from President Fidel Castro,” Raul Castro told heads of state and government at the Non-Aligned Movement summit of 118 developing countries, of the iconic revolutionary.
Taking a high-profile international role for the first time since being handed Cuba’s helm on July 31 after his brother Fidel, 80, underwent surgery, Raul Castro, 75, said that “as (Fidel) makes a slow and satisfactory recovery ... he has followed every detail of preparations for this important gathering.
Then, General Raul Castro made it clear who was leading Cuba’s charge. He proceeded to unleash a forceful and scathing attack on a US plan for regime change in Havana, home to the Americas’ only one-party Communist regime.
“The United States has gone to such an extreme as to present an official plan aimed at destroying our social system,” backed by US President George W. Bush, Raul Castro charged.
He blasted what he called the irrational aspirations of the United States to dominate the world, and slammed its “insatiable thirst for strategic resources.”
“The risk of aggression and more wars of imperial (US) conquest is more serious and more widespread than ever,” Raul Castro warned, “with the proclamation of ... doctrines based on preventative war ... brandishing the war on terror, promoting democracy and the existence of rogue states as a pretext.”
“Let us join forces closely ... in the United Nations and other international forums to demand economic justice,” Raul Castro said. “Let us join forces to demand the right to development ... and the right to a future.”
There had been speculation that the convalescing Fidel Castro — Cuba’s leader for almost five decades — might be greeting leaders at their top-level meeting. But doctors recommended he continue to rest, Cuban officials said.
Raul Castro earlier appeared at ease smiling and joking as he greeted UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and developing nation leaders such as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, Philippine President Gloria Arroyo and Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe.—AFP
