Castro, Cold Warrior, Signs Off

THE last of the Cold War warriors has relinquished his grip on power.

Fidel Castro, the man who took the world to the brink of nuclear war and made it think he would die with his boots on, has given up the presidency of Cuba because of ailing health.

After almost a half century of defying the United States, the revolutionary leader delivered a message to his people through the online version of the Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma.

The 81-year-old said he would not seek the presidency again when it is decided this month. "I neither will aspire to nor will I accept the position of president of the council of state and commander-in-chief," he wrote, almost 19 months after undergoing intestinal surgery.

"It would betray my conscience to take up a responsibility that requires mobility and total devotion, that I am not in physical condition to offer."

His message came just five days before a historic session in the National Assembly, in which he was up for re-election for another five years.

Dr Castro outlasted and antagonised no fewer than nine American presidents during his 49-year rule. US President George Bush said he hoped Castros retirement would be the start of a new era of "democratic transition" in communist Cuba.

Speaking in Rwanda, where he is on a five-country African trip, he said the US would "help the people of Cuba realise the blessings of liberty".

He said the first step should be to free political prisoners, followed by setting up institutions necessary for free and fair elections. "And I mean free and fair. Not these kind of staged elections that the Castro brothers try to foist off as being true democracy," he said.

The European Union said it would try to relaunch ties with Cuba that were largely frozen under Dr Castro.

Out of public sight since his surgery, Dr Castro has published columns in the Cuban media, titled "Reflections of a Commander in Chief".

In his retirement message, he said: "I am not saying farewell. I want only to fight as a soldier of ideas. I will continue writing under the title Reflections of Comrade Fidel. I will be one more weapon in the arsenal that you can count on. Perhaps my voice will be heard."

Some speculate Dr Castros brother Raul, who took power while he was ill, may become president permanently, or that another top regime official might move up the ladder, finally ending the formal link to Dr Castro.

Dr Castro and his guerilla force, the 26 July Movement — which included Argentine revolutionary Che Guevara — overthrew Fulgencio Batista in a popular revolt in 1959. In 1962, Dr Castro was pivotal, along with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and Americas John F. Kennedy, in the defining moment of the Cold War — the Cuban missile crisis. By allowing the Soviet Union to deploy nuclear missiles on Americas doorstep, he took the superpowers to the brink of nuclear war.

Famed for his olive fatigues, fiery oratory, straggly beard and cigars, he kept a tight clamp on dissent at home while defining himself abroad with his defiance of Washington. He dodged all his enemies could throw at him, including assassination plots, a US-backed invasion at the Bay of Pigs and a punishing US trade embargo.

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