Raúl Modesto Castro Ruz (Birán, Holguín, Cuba, June 3, 1931) is a Cuban military officer and politician, the younger brother and collaborator of Fidel Castro. He has been the President of the Council of State of Cuba, and thus the President of Cuba, since February 24, 2008, although he served in an interim capacity since July 31, 2006. He also holds the military rank of Army General. Since April 2011, he has been the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba, replacing his brother Fidel in that position as well.
Son of the Lugo citizen Ángel Castro Argiz, he is the youngest of the three Castro brothers. Like Fidel, Raúl later attended the Jesuit School of Dolores in Santiago de Cuba and the Colegio de Belén in Havana. The brothers actively participated in student protests. Raúl was a convinced communist and joined the Socialist Youth, affiliated with the Cuban Communist Party, which was then called the Popular Socialist Party (PSP).
Cuban Revolution (1953-59)
Raúl Castro, on the left, with Che Guevara in 1958.
Together with his brother, he was one of the members of the 26th of July Movement, which carried out the assault on the Moncada Barracks on July 26, 1953, in the city of Santiago de Cuba. During the attack, he was tasked with supporting the actions from the rooftop of the courthouse in that city, a mission he accomplished. He was later arrested following the events and sentenced to 13 years in prison. After being granted amnesty, he exiled himself in Mexico, where he participated in the preparations for the expedition of the Granma yacht, which would land in Cuba in December 1956 after a long journey.
He met Che Guevara in Mexico City and introduced him to Fidel's revolutionary circle. Raúl also reached out to KGB agent Nikolai Leonov, whom he had met during his trip through the Eastern Bloc countries. This relationship would persist until the Castro brothers took power in Cuba.
As a fighter in the Rebel Army, he participated in the Sierra Maestra campaign. On February 27, 1958, he was appointed commander and assigned the mission of crossing the former province of Oriente, leading a column of guerrillas to open the Second Eastern Front "Frank País" (in honor of a leader of the underground movement who was assassinated by Batista's forces in the city of Santiago de Cuba) to the northeast. On that front, Raúl organized and structured a true government in the liberated territories, even creating the Rebel Air Force and the first intelligence and police institutions of the revolutionaries, as well as health, education, and other departments.
Post-revolutionary period (1959-2006)
In 1961, he became part of the National Directorate of the Integrated Revolutionary Organizations. After the departure of Che Guevara, he became the second political figure in the government. He participated in the leadership of the United Party of the Socialist Revolution (PURS) in 1963. He was responsible for the investigation, denunciation, and prosecution of the members of the so-called "micro-fraction" within the Communist Party. From 1980 onward, he took on supervisory roles alongside his brother in the Ministries of Defense, Interior, Culture, and Public Health.
Interim government (2006-2008)
Raúl Castro alongside former president of Brazil, Lula.
The constitutional successor to Fidel Castro, on July 31, 2006, his secretary, Carlos Valenciaga, announced that Raúl would temporarily assume the presidency of the Council of State, the secretaryship of the PCC, and the command of the Armed Forces while his brother recovered from intestinal surgery.
During the time Raúl temporarily led Cuba, there were notable slight increases in the economy and a mass debate, initiated by him, regarding the nation's problems, which resulted in public proposals from the population starting on July 26, 2007.
In these debates, over 5 million proposals from citizens were made, forming the basis for addressing the problems that hinder the development of Cuban society.
Government (since 2008)
On February 24, 2008, he was elected President of the Council of State of Cuba by the Deputies of the National Assembly of People's Power, thus succeeding his brother Fidel Castro as the president of Cuba, who had resigned just days earlier through an open letter.
New measures and changes in Cuban policy
..."In December, I spoke about the excess of prohibitions and regulations, and in the coming weeks we will begin to eliminate the simplest ones. Many of them had the sole purpose of preventing the emergence of new inequalities at a time of widespread scarcity, even at the cost of not collecting certain revenues." Raúl Castro Ruz February 24, 20081
In accordance with what was expressed in February 2008, Raúl Castro began to lift various legal barriers that restricted the people, such as the free access to hotels and the rental of cars or allowing the unrestricted sale of cell phones. In his constitutive session, he requested the National Assembly of the People's Power for an extension until the end of 2008 for the restructuring of the Government, which occurred in March 2009 with the merging of several ministries and the replacement of almost half of the ministers, including the well-known Carlos Lage Dávila and Felipe Pérez Roque.
Between September and November 2008, Cuba was struck by hurricanes Gustav, Ike, and Paloma, causing over ten billion in economic losses. The hurricanes dealt a severe blow to the Cuban economy, being described as the worst natural disaster in its history. This resulted in a shortage of food across the country and the implementation of strict measures to control any attempts at hoarding or speculation of goods and food
Since September 2008, the Cuban state decided to grant usufruct rights to farmers for idle lands. By December 2009, 920 thousand hectares of land had been allocated in a process that is not without difficulties and delays
In January 2009, the Social Security Law was reformed, raising the retirement age to 60 for women and 65 for men. This year, the salary cap was also eliminated, dual employment was authorized, and payment by results was reinstated.
Since October 2009, the workers' cafeterias, another form of subsidy in the country, have been closing down, and in their place, workers were given an additional 15 pesos per day for their lunch or snack.
In the same year, 2009, the Castro government allowed Cubans to access the Internet in the country's post offices, although some technical issues have arisen due to the U.S. embargo preventing fast connections. This situation was expected to improve after the completion in 2011 of a submarine cable between Venezuela and the island
On October 10, 2009, Lázaro Barredo, director of Granma, the newspaper of the Communist Party of Cuba, announced that the ration booklet would be abolished and that food assistance would be granted only to pensioners and people with low incomes.
At the end of October 2010, the Cuban government allowed 178 private activities, with the goal of moving 1 million workers from bureaucratic jobs to productive roles, both public and private, within a period of three to five years.
In April 2011, he was elected as the first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba at the VI Congress, where economic reforms were established to adapt the system to new economic developments and the global and national crisis.
On February 24, 2013, the National Assembly of People's Power re-elected Raúl Castro as president of the Council of State.
International relations
Raúl Castro and Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in 2009.
From the early moments of his provisional government, Raúl Castro began re-evaluating relations with nations such as Mexico and Russia, and there was also a noticeable strengthening of ties with China.
In his speech on December 2, 2006, Raúl Castro, then the provisional president of Cuba, announced that the Cuban government was willing to start conversations with the United States in order to end the diplomatic limitations between the two nations, which represents a definitive blow to the policy of rejecting anything American. The only condition set by the Cuban government is that the U.S. does not impose any conditions to begin such dialogue.
In a recent interview with American actor Sean Penn, he expressed that he was open to a dialogue with elected President Barack Obama, and that this interview could even take place on the territory of the Guantanamo Naval Base.
In December 2008, Raúl Castro undertook an important international tour that included Venezuela and Brazil. The main highlight of his trip was his participation in the First Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean, held in the city of Salvador da Bahia. The context of this summit facilitated Cuba's entry into the Rio Group.
On February 24, 2013, the National Assembly of People's Power reelected Raúl Castro as president of the Council of State
On December 17, 2014, he announced, alongside his American counterpart Barack Obama, the restoration of diplomatic relations between the United States of America and the Republic of Cuba.
On April 19, 2018, Miguel Díaz-Canel was elected president by the IX Legislature of the National Assembly of Cuba for the 2018-2023 term. In this way, he ceased his role as President of the Council of State but retained his position as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba.
Family
Raúl was married to Vilma Espín from the beginning of the Cuban Revolution until her passing (June 18, 2007). He has four children from this marriage: Deborah, Mariela, Nilsa, and Alejandro.
