Cuba held a traditional rally on Sunday to mark one of the revolution’s most important anniversaries but former president Raul Castro was absent.
It was the first time in at least 30 years that the 95-year-old Castro did not attend the event, and no explanation was given. President Miguel Diaz-Canel read a congratulatory message from Castro to his countrymen at the meeting, held in the eastern town of Pinar del Río.
The annual event commemorates the July 26, 1953 attack led by brothers Fidel and Raul Castro on the camp of Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Cespedes in eastern Cuba.
The military action against former dictator Fulgencio Batista failed but marked the beginning of the revolutionary struggle that culminated on January 1, 1959.
The last public appearance of Raul Castro was in June, during the event to establish the Ministry of Interior, and on May 1 to celebrate Labor Day.
Although he no longer holds any official positions, Raul Castro’s symbolic presence is strong and he was recently recognized as one of the mediators in negotiations with the United States following the imposition of US energy embargoes.
Facing a crowd of hundreds waving Cuban flags early Sunday, Diaz-Canel rejected a report the US State Department published last week that accused Cuba of running a left-wing spy network and lobbying against the US and South America for decades.
