The Union of Young Communists and the Martiano Youth Movement presented on Friday in Havana the book Revolution, the most beautiful work, as part of the activities organized by the Cuban regime to celebrate the 95th birthday of Raúl Castro.
The event took place at the Palace of Pioneers in the El Fanguito neighborhood, in the Plaza de la Revolución municipality, and constituted the second community presentation of a program promoted by the official youth organizations, showing a report from the official Canal Caribe.
Neighbors, local leaders, and representatives from the National Bureau participated in a meeting dedicated to reflecting on the relevance of Castro's thought in present-day Cuba. According to the source, all attendees received free copies of the work.
The volume, published by Ediciones Celia, a division of the Office of Historical Affairs of the Presidency of Cuba, gathers speeches, interviews, and statements made by Castro over more than half a century.
The edition was originally released in 2021, when the former president turned 90, and includes 138 interventions made between 2006 and 2019, as well as key documents from the Communist Party congresses.
The presentation is part of a broader editorial strategy aimed at strengthening Castro's political image.
In October 2025, the regime launched the Raúl Castro Ruz Collection, Selected Works, consisting of nine volumes and over 5,000 pages, an initiative supported by the donation of 3,000 collections made by the Party and the Government of China.
In February, the collection was relaunched at official events led by the president of Casa de las Américas Abel Prieto and the historian Elier Ramírez, accompanied by a preface from the ruling Miguel Díaz-Canel, in which he described Castro as his guide.
The propaganda offensive coincides with a national political mobilization campaign that began on May 23 through Anti-imperialist Open Forums across the country.
The activities will culminate on June 3, the birthday of Castro, and aim to address the criminal charges filed by the U.S. Department of Justice regarding the downing of the planes belonging to Hermanos al Rescate in 1996.
The indictment, approved by a federal grand jury in the Southern District of Florida on April 23 and declassified on May 20, includes charges of conspiracy to kill American citizens, destruction of civilian aircraft, and four counts of homicide for the deaths of Armando Alejandre Jr., Carlos Costa, Mario de la Peña, and Pablo Morales.
The editorial deployment also occurs amidst a deep contradiction. While the regime allocates resources to reissue speeches and works by its main leaders, Cuba is experiencing one of the worst crises in its publishing and press system in decades.
Since March, provincial newspapers have stopped circulating in print format, and the national newspapers Granma and Juventud Rebelde have reduced their publication to a single weekly edition of eight pages due to a lack of paper and resources.
The situation is particularly striking following the government's recent celebration of the Cuban Book Day, which advocated for popular access to reading. However, the current reality is far from that foundational promise.
The country that in 1959 printed 400,000 copies of Don Quijote de la Mancha as a symbol of cultural democratization now faces such a severe shortage that it cannot even maintain the regular circulation of its own official media.
The promotion of new editions dedicated to Castro is occurring while wide areas of the country are suffering from power outages of over 20 hours a day, and a survey revealed that one in three Cuban families experienced hunger during 2025, a contrast that highlights the gap between the propaganda priorities of the government and the daily urgencies of the population.
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