分类： politics

In a decisive move to safeguard the integrity of Brazil’s upcoming presidential election, the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) has moved to shut down a coordinated plot to fraudulently alter the party registration records of two of the country’s leading presidential contenders. The action, announced Thursday, was greenlit by TSE President Kassio Nunes Marques, who launched a formal investigation into the irregularities and issued an immediate temporary suspension of all ongoing processing of contested party affiliation changes to block any further illegal tampering with official electoral records.

Court documents confirm that one of the highest-profile targets of the scheme was Flavio Bolsonaro, the 2022 presidential nominee for Brazil’s right-wing Liberal Party (PL). Bad actors had fraudulently secured a false party affiliation for Bolsonaro with the minor Mission Party, a move that would have thrown his eligibility for the general election into question if left unaddressed. After leaders of the Liberal Party filed an official emergency request to correct the record, Nunes Marques granted the request, ordered the full investigation into the fraudulent registration, and formally reversed the illegal change, reinstating Bolsonaro’s valid affiliation with the PL.

The TSE’s investigation also uncovered a second, parallel attempt to tamper with the party registration of incumbent Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who is running for re-election on the ticket of the left-wing Workers’ Party (PT). Unlike the successful fraudulent swap executed for Bolsonaro, the court confirmed that bad actors were not able to finalize the illegal change to Lula da Silva’s registration before the scheme was uncovered. The temporary freeze on contested affiliation changes implemented by Nunes Marques is designed to prevent bad actors from completing similar illegal alterations before the election, reinforcing safeguards for Brazil’s democratic process amid growing concerns over electoral interference.

Amid growing cross-border tensions between Spain and Morocco, Spanish authorities have moved to reinforce security at the frontiers of its two North African autonomous cities, Ceuta and Melilla, both of which share a land border with Morocco. The ramp-up in defensive measures comes in response to widespread warnings that another large-scale migrant incursion is planned for August 15.

Relations between the two neighboring states have been strained since an unprecedented mass crossing on July 30, when roughly 72,000 migrants entered Ceuta in a single wave of arrivals. While senior Spanish government officials have repeatedly sought to highlight what they frame as productive cooperation from Rabat on border management, independent analysts and international affairs specialists have pushed back against that narrative. These experts argue that Morocco’s deliberate decision to avoid intervening to stop the crossing at minimum created the conditions that allowed the unprecedented influx to take place.

In the wake of the July incursion, Spanish authorities have facilitated the return of most migrants to Moroccan territory. However, the crisis has already left a devastating human toll: official and on-the-ground accounts confirm more than 100 migrant deaths have been recorded, while approximately 1,500 unaccompanied child migrants remain in Spanish custody, and around 4,000 additional people are still unhoused and wandering Ceuta’s public streets.

The standoff has escalated further in recent days after senior Moroccan officials made public pro-independence statements regarding the contested autonomous territories, which have long been a point of friction between Spain and Morocco. In a bold address that garnered overwhelming public backing across Spain, Defense Minister Margarita Robles delivered a firm rebuke of Rabat’s claims two days ago. Robles stressed that both Ceuta and Melilla are unquestionably an integral part of Spanish sovereign territory, and that no challenge to that status would be tolerated. “Any act of aggression against Ceuta or Melilla is an act of aggression against the entire nation of Spain,” Robles stated, cementing the Spanish government’s uncompromising stance amid the escalating crisis.

On August 13, 2026 — designated the “Year of the Centennial of Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz” — Cuba’s top leader Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel Bermúdez delivered a landmark closing address at the Carlos Marx Theater, wrapping up the First International Colloquium *“Fidel: Legacy and Future”* during a national political and cultural observance of Fidel Castro’s 100th birth anniversary.

Opening his remarks, Díaz-Canel extended greetings to retired revolutionary leader Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, Fidel Castro’s family, and gathered delegates, emphasizing that Fidel’s legacy endures across every generation, region, and community of people fighting for global equity. The centenary colloquium drew more than 1,500 registered participants from 63 nations, including 500 Cuban delegates, with thousands more international and domestic supporters unable to attend due to logistical constraints amid the country’s ongoing economic pressures. Díaz-Canel credited organizers from the Fidel Castro Ruz Center and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba’s Ideological Department, alongside partnering institutions, for pulling off the major international gathering against the backdrop of severe national resource limitations, and called for all colloquium presentations to be widely disseminated to capture new insights from those who worked directly with Fidel and scholars who have spent decades studying his global impact.

Against the backdrop of what he described as a “brutal and immoral imperial blockade” aimed at destroying Cuba’s sovereignty and people, Díaz-Canel framed the centenary celebration as yet another testament to Cuban resilience and international solidarity. He highlighted that delegates traveled from distant nations, covered their own expenses, brought donations, and accepted limited material conditions to participate, turning what many considered an impossible event into a tangible demonstration of global support for Fidel’s ideals. “Fidel is not only from Cuba,” Díaz-Canel stressed. “He belongs to all revolutionaries of the world, and to all humanity.”

Díaz-Canel clarified that following Fidel’s principles does not mean blind adherence, but rather a commitment to permanent anti-imperialist struggle against global injustice. He noted that hundreds of assassination attempts against Fidel failed to diminish his legacy, and instead amplified it: today, millions of people across the world carry forward his vision, not just out of nostalgia, but to build a more just future, refusing to surrender to what he called the “plunder and greed” of a decadent global empire.

A core focus of the address was the central role of young people in advancing Fidel’s legacy. Díaz-Canel shared his impressions from the accompanying Youth Forum, noting that young delegates displayed extraordinary maturity, shaped by their experience navigating the inequalities of capitalist societies and hardened by renewed Cold War-era McCarthyist repression for their decision to attend the centenary event in Cuba. He recalled Fidel’s own roots as a young revolutionary activist: as a university student who cut his political teeth organizing against dictatorship, transformed journalism into a tool for popular denunciation, and took up armed struggle after constitutional paths to reform were closed by the Batista coup. For this new generation of young Fidel followers, Díaz-Canel bestowed the official title of the “Fidel Centennial Generation”, stressing that Fidel always entrusted young people with the movement’s most critical tasks, viewing youth as the most passionately revolutionary phase of life.

Díaz-Canel warned of growing global threats to progressive movements, including the resurgence of fascism, an ideological war aimed at erasing historical memory and imposing capitalist hegemony on the Global South, and coordinated disinformation campaigns that label core human values obsolete to justify illegal aggression, from the ongoing genocide in Gaza to attacks on Iran and Cuba’s ongoing energy blockade. He called for all progressive, emancipatory, and socialist forces to unify, rejecting pressure to avoid radical language that would leave movements paralyzed at a moment when collective mobilization is the only path to survival and change.

Looking back to a reflection Fidel published exactly 10 years and one day before the centenary, Díaz-Canel noted that the text has gained renewed relevance today. In that final birthday reflection before his death, Fidel recalled his childhood in Birán, his father the Spanish immigrant, his early love of nature, and the formation of his ethical worldview through Cuban history. Even at 90, Díaz-Canel recalled, Fidel remained endlessly curious about scientific progress, deeply concerned for humanity’s future, and unflinching in his criticism of U.S. hegemony, never hesitating to expose collaborators and sellouts.

Against the intensification of the U.S. blockade that has restricted Cuban well-being in every area, Díaz-Canel said Fidel’s legacy remains the clearest path forward, anchored in three non-negotiable principles: national independence, the ongoing Cuban Revolution, and the values and gains of socialism. Under these principles, Cuba continues its process of economic and social transformation, centered on the popular well-being and social justice that Fidel spent his life defending.

Díaz-Canel concluded that the gathering of global supporters in blockaded, harassed Cuba itself is the greatest possible monument to Fidel on his centenary. He thanked international solidarity activists for complementing the Cuban people’s heroic resistance, echoing Raúl Castro’s summary of Fidel’s core teaching: that people can overcome even the harshest conditions if their will to win holds, they assess circumstances clearly, and they never abandon their just principles.

Fidel, Díaz-Canel stressed, lives on in every Cuban doctor saving lives amid medicine shortages, every teacher showing up to work in cities and remote mountain communities, every worker reporting to their job despite the blockade’s resource restrictions, and every combatant willing to sacrifice for homeland and socialism. When future historians study Fidel Castro Ruz, he argued, they will not only see one man — they will see an entire people, and millions of people across the world, who inspired by Fidel’s example defeated the most powerful criminal empire in history and carved out their own place in history. The address closed with resounding chants of *“Long live Fidel! Long live a free, sovereign and independent Cuba! Long live socialism! Homeland or Death! We shall overcome!”*

On August 13, 2026, Cuba opened a new chapter of collective historical memory to mark the 100th birth anniversary of legendary revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, gathering domestic leaders, global allies and people from all walks of Cuban life for a moving political and cultural tribute that also closed the first international colloquium titled *Fidel: Legacy and Future*.

Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, a core leader of the Cuban Revolution and Fidel Castro’s lifelong comrade and brother-in-arms, headlined the event alongside Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic. The event, hosted at Havana’s iconic Karl Marx Theater, also welcomed special guest Rebel Army Commander José Ramón Machado Ventura, alongside senior members of the Political Bureau, the Central Committee Secretariat, other Party, State and Government leaders, representatives of political, mass and social organizations, top officials from the Ministry of the Interior and the Revolutionary Armed Forces, Fidel Castro’s immediate family, his long-time close collaborators, and delegates to the week-long colloquium that had brought together supporters from 63 countries starting August 10.

Before the formal program began, colloquium delegates broke into resounding chants that echoed through the theater: first “Fidel, Fidel”, then the beloved rallying cry “It can be heard, it can be felt, Fidel is present”. For attendees, this chant was far more than symbolic: Fidel’s presence persists, multiplied across the Cuban people, embedded in his transformative ideas, and embodied in the Cuban Revolution, his most enduring contribution to global history.

In his keynote address, President Díaz-Canel walked attendees through the extraordinary, impactful life of Fidel Castro, framing the centenary as a celebration of a lifelong warrior, “a rebel, a fighter, a righteous man of Cuba, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean. A righteous man of humanity.”

Díaz-Canel highlighted the remarkable achievement of hosting the international colloquium despite the ongoing harsh U.S. imperial blockade that has strangled Cuba’s economy for decades. He extended special recognition to all international delegates who overcame significant logistical and political obstacles to stand in solidarity with Cuba, and paid particular emotional tribute to young Cubans, whom he dubbed the “Fidel Centennial Generation”.

“Fidel is not only from Cuba. Fidel belongs to all revolutionaries of the world who admire his work and share his ideas. Fidel belongs to all of humanity,” Díaz-Canel affirmed. He emphasized that identifying as a follower of Fidel means committing to being a permanent anti-imperialist, standing against every form of global injustice. From Fidel, Díaz-Canel recalled, the Cuban people inherited three non-negotiable, inalienable principles: unwavering defense of national independence, preservation of the Revolution, and upholding the core values and transformative gains of Cuban socialism. He confirmed that all ongoing economic and social reforms in Cuba remain rooted in these guiding principles.

“When future historians look back in time, searching for Fidel Castro Ruz, they will no longer see just one man,” Díaz-Canel stressed. “They will see millions who, inspired by his exemplary life, earned a place in history, with the unwavering resolve that this nation has demonstrated.”

The most heartfelt tribute of the day came from Cuba’s youngest generation, delivered via a moving performance by children’s theater company La Colmenita. The production wove together Fidel Castro’s core beliefs and legacy, framing sport as a universal right for all people, science as the non-negotiable foundation of the nation’s future, and collective heroism as the face of Cuban dignity.

The stage was reimagined as a pioneer explorer camp, a form of youth development Fidel Castro long championed for its ability to build character. It brought to life iconic Cuban figures that embody Fidel’s legacy: sporting legends Ana Fidelia Quirot and Pedro Luis Lazo, pioneering scientists Jorge Berlanga and Belinda Sánchez, and national heroes including Antonio Guerrero, Gerardo Hernández, and Elián González — for whom the Cuban government, under Fidel’s leadership and alongside Raúl Castro, waged and won a fierce international battle to return Elián to his home country.

Reciting a passage from Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano that describes human life as “a sea of little flames”, the performance captured Fidel Castro’s singular intensity: he burned with such unwavering passion that one cannot look at him without blinking, and all who engage with his legacy today, just as when he was alive, are ignited by that fire. Lines from Cuban national hero José Martí, recited by a young performer playing a scientist, fit Fidel perfectly — he was widely regarded as Martí’s greatest modern disciple. “If I was of any use before now, I no longer remember: what I want is to serve more,” Martí wrote, a creed that Fidel embodied throughout his life of struggle for Cuban and global justice.

Throughout the performance, one core value emerged as central to Fidel’s legacy, a principle that Cuba has made its national banner alongside Fidel: solidarity. From Fidel, Cubans learned to share what they have, even when resources are scarce. Guided by that ethos, this small Caribbean nation has extended medical and humanitarian aid to the most remote corners of the globe, in the name of preserving life, while wealthy global powers often bring only conflict and destruction. Cuba has long embodied Fidel’s vision: standing tall, head held high, with an outstretched hand to lift others up. This is Fidel’s Cuba: a nation that continues to defy expectations, and in saving its own sovereign project, lifts up other marginalized nations across the Global South.

Writers and young artists framed Fidel as a “conqueror of the impossible”, a modern Quixote who fought against overwhelming odds to advance justice. Journalist and writer Katiuska Blanco shared intimate anecdotes from Fidel’s childhood growing up on his family’s estate in Birán, noting that even from a young age, his sense of justice and determination marked him as a leader who would write brilliant new pages of Cuban history.

La Colmenita’s performance also addressed Cuba’s current challenges, emphasizing that Fidel’s legacy teaches Cubans to face obstacles with creativity, unity and sharp intelligence. It called out the U.S. blockade as the most severe barrier to Cuban progress, but stressed that it can never be stronger than the Cuban people’s will to prevail. This conviction, Raúl Castro reminded attendees, grows directly from “Fidel’s enduring teachings”, whose legacy, the international colloquium confirmed, remains the most reliable compass for Cuba’s future.

The deep, enduring friendship between Fidel Castro and Venezuelan Bolivarian leader Hugo Chávez was another centerpiece of the tribute, with anecdotes highlighting how Chávez’s relationship with Fidel reinforced a core truth: no one who encountered Fidel Castro remained indifferent to his extraordinary personality and moral authority.

As with all major Cuban national events, poetry and music formed the emotional backbone of the day. The stirring melody of the 26th of July Movement Anthem rang through the theater, a reminder of how Fidel, Raúl, and their fellow revolutionaries turned the defeat of the 1953 Moncada Barracks attack into the foundation of ultimate victory over the Batista dictatorship. The notes of the Cuban National Anthem followed, a timeless call to action that retains its urgency even amid ongoing external threat, reminding Cubans that “to die for the Fatherland is to live.”

To mark the centennial, the entire auditorium joined in singing “Happy Birthday” to Fidel, a tribute echoed across the entire island — his great home, which has been steered by Raúl Castro through decades of revolutionary struggle, alongside Fidel in countless chapters of shared glory. When the performance curtain fell, the theater erupted in chants of “I am Fidel” and “Cuba is not alone”, followed by a wave of thunderous applause that lasted for minutes. For all gathered in that space, there was no doubt: Fidel Castro lives on, in the Cuban people, in his ideas, and in the global struggle for justice.