Fidel
Castro, the Cuban revolutionary leader who built a communist state on the
doorstep of the United States is dead.
Mr.
Castro, who for five decades defied U.S. efforts to topple him, died on Friday
at the age of 90, state-run Cuban Television said.
Mr. Castro
had been in poor health since an intestinal ailment nearly killed him in 2006
and he formally ceded power to his younger brother, Raul, two years later.
It was
Raul who announced his brother died on Friday evening.
Mr. Castro
took power in a 1959 revolution and ruled Cuba for 49 years with a mix of
charisma and iron will, creating a one-party state and becoming a central
figure in the Cold War.
He was
demonized by the United States and its allies but admired by many leftists
around the world, especially socialist revolutionaries in Latin America and
Africa.
Mr. Castro
transformed Cuba from a playground for rich Americans into a symbol of
resistance to Washington.
He fended
off a CIA-backed invasion at the Bay of Pigs in 1961 as well as countless assassination
attempts.
His
alliance with Moscow helped trigger the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, a 13-day
showdown with the United States that brought the world the closest it has been
to nuclear war.
He swept
away capitalism and won support for bringing schools and hospitals to the poor.
He also
created legions of enemies and critics, concentrated among Cuban exiles in
Miami who fled his rule and saw him as a ruthless tyrant.
In the
end, it was neither the efforts of Washington and Cuban exiles nor the collapse
of Soviet communism that ended his rule.
Instead,
illness forced him to cede power to his younger brother Raul, provisionally in
2006 and definitively in 2008
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