Raúl Castro

Raúl Modesto Castro Ruz (Birán, Holguín, Cuba, June 3, 1931) is a Cuban military officer and politician, younger brother and collaborator of Fidel Castro. He has been the president of the Council of State of Cuba and, therefore, president of Cuba, since February 24, 2008, although he had been serving in the position on an interim basis 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, also replacing his brother Fidel in this position.

Son of the Lucense citizen Ángel Castro Argiz, he is the youngest of the three Castro brothers. Like Fidel, Raúl later attended the Jesuit College 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 at that time was 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 Movimiento 26 de Julio, 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 subsequently arrested and sentenced to 13 years in prison. After being amnestied, he went into exile 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 contacted KGB agent Nikolai Leonov, whom he had met during his travels through the Eastern bloc nations. This relationship would continue until the Castro brothers took power in Cuba.

As a combatant of 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 assassinated by Batista's forces in the city of Santiago de Cuba) towards the northeast. In that front, Raúl organized and structured a true government in the liberated territories, even creating the Rebel Air Force, as well as the first intelligence and police institutions of the revolutionaries, in addition to departments for health, education, etc.

Post-revolutionary period (1959-2006) In 1961, he became part of the National Directorate of Integrated Revolutionary Organizations. After Che Guevara's departure, 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 in charge of investigating, denouncing, and prosecuting the members of the so-called "microfraction" within the Communist Party. Starting in 1980, he held supervisory roles alongside his brother in the Ministries of Defense, Interior, Culture, and Public Health.

Interim government (2006-2008)

Raúl Castro alongside former Brazilian President Lula. 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 position of commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces while his brother recovered from intestinal surgery.

During the time Raúl led the destinies of Cuba provisionally, slight increases in the economy were highlighted, as well as the massive debate he incited regarding the problems of the nation, which resulted in public proposals from the population starting on July 26, 2007.

In these debates, more than 5 million proposals from the citizenry were made, serving as a basis for solving 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 President of Cuba, who had resigned 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 objective of preventing the emergence of new inequalities, at a time of widespread scarcity, even at the cost of forgoing certain revenues." Raúl Castro Ruz February 24, 2008. Fulfilling what was expressed in February 2008, Raúl Castro began to lift various legal barriers that restricted the people, such as the case of unrestricted access to hotels and car rentals, or allowing the free sale of cell phones. During his constitutive session, he requested a deadline extension until the end of 2008 from the National Assembly of the People’s Power for the restructuring of the Government, which took place 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 hit by hurricanes Gustav, Ike, and Paloma, which caused over ten billion in economic losses. The hurricanes dealt a severe blow to the Cuban economy, described as the worst natural disaster in its history. This resulted in food shortages throughout the country and the implementation of strict measures to control any attempt at hoarding or speculation of goods and food.

Since September 2008, the Cuban state decided to grant usufruct rights to farmers for idle land. By December 2009, 920,000 hectares of land had been granted in a process that is not free of difficulties and delays.

In January 2009, the Social Security Law was reformed, raising the retirement age to 60 years for women and 65 years for men. Also this year, the salary cap was eliminated, dual employment was authorized, and performance-based pay was reestablished.

Since October 2009, the workers' canteens, another of the country's subsidies, have been closing, and instead, workers were given an additional amount of 15 pesos per day for their lunch or snack.

This same year, 2009, the Castro government allowed Cubans to access the Internet at the country's post offices, although there have been some technical problems, due to the U.S. embargo preventing fast connectivity, which would be resolved with the completion in 2011 of an underwater cable between Venezuela and the island.

On October 10, 2009, Lázaro Barredo, director of the Granma newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party, announced that the ration book would be eliminated and food assistance would be granted only to retirees and people with low incomes.

By the end of October 2010, the Cuban government has allowed the exercise of 178 private activities, with the goal of moving 1 million workers from bureaucratic jobs to productive ones, both public and private, within a period of three to five years.

In April 2011, he was elected First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba at the VI Congress, where economic reforms were established to adapt the system to the new economic events 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. Raúl Castro began from the very first moments of his provisional government to review relations with countries such as Mexico and Russia, and the strengthening of ties with China was also evident.

In his speech on December 2, 2006, Raúl Castro, then provisional president of Cuba, announced that the Cuban government was willing to begin conversations with the United States in order to end the diplomatic limitations between both nations, which represents a definitive blow to the policy of rejecting everything American. The only condition of the Cuban government is that, precisely, the U.S. does not impose any conditions to initiate such dialogue.

In a recent interview with American actor Sean Penn, he stated that he was open to a dialogue with the elected president Barack Obama, and that such an interview could even take place on the territory of the Guantanamo Naval Base.

In December 2008, Raúl Castro made an important international tour that included Venezuela and Brazil. The main highlight of his tour was his participation in the I Summit of Latin America and the Caribbean, held in the city of Salvador da Bahia. The context of that summit served for Cuba's entry into the Rio Group.

On February 24, 2013, the National Assembly of People's Power re-elected Raúl Castro as president of the Council of State.

On December 17, 2014, he announced, alongside his U.S. 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 term 2018-2023. In this way, he ceased his position as President of the Council of State but retained his role as First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba.

Family Raúl was married to Vilma Espín from the early days of the Cuban Revolution until her death (June 18, 2007). They have four children from this marriage: Deborah, Mariela, Nilsa, and Alejandro.