HAVANA: Camilo Guevara March, the eldest son of communist revolutionary icon Ernesto “Che” Guevara, died in Caracas aged 60, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said on Tuesday.

According to Prensa Latina, Guevara March was visiting Venezuela when he died on Monday due to a blood clot that led to a heart attack.

“It is with great sadness that we say goodbye to Camilo, son of Che and promoter of his ideas,” said Diaz-Canel on Twitter.

He was the eldest of four children that Argentine Guevara had with Cuban Aleida March.

Guevara also had a daughter, Hilda, from a previous marriage to Peruvian Hilda Gadea.

A graduate in labour law, Guevara March was the director of the Center for Che Guevara Studies in Havana, an institution dedicated to promoting the work and ideology of his father, who remains a hugely influential figure in Cuba.

Born in Argentina, Guevara studied medicine before traveling through Latin America, when he met Cuban revolutionaries Fidel and Raul Castro in Mexico.

Guevara joined their army and helped overthrow US-backed Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, before later unsuccessfully atte­mp­ting to spark similar Mar­xist revolutions in Congo and then Bolivia, where he was shot dead by a soldier in 1967 at age 39.

Published in Dawn, August 31st, 2022