标签： Cuba

On Thursday, Cuba held a solemn state funeral to honor one of its most revered revolutionary leaders, Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, at the Ernesto Che Guevara Sculptural Complex in Santa Clara, drawing hundreds of Villa Clara residents who joined as representatives of the Cuban people to pay their final respects.

Floral tributes were placed at the ceremony on behalf of Army General Raúl Castro Ruz; Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic; the Association of Cuban Combatants; the Cuban people; and Valdés’s immediate family.

In his keynote address at the memorial service, President Díaz-Canel highlighted the extraordinary legacy of a commander who dedicated more than seven decades of his life to the Cuban revolutionary cause, earning his status as an irreplaceable pillar of the nation’s revolutionary movement.

“Amid the deep sorrow of his passing, no matter how full a life he lived or how much he gave to our country, we still feel his absence acutely,” Díaz-Canel told the gathered crowd. “It is only right that we express our gratitude for the outpouring of solidarity from across all of Cuba as we bid him farewell, and for all the lessons we have drawn from his remarkable, exemplary life.”

The president walked attendees through key chapters of Valdés’s decades-long revolutionary career, recalling his participation in the 1953 Moncada Barracks attack, the historic Granma expedition that launched the revolutionary insurgency, and the years of guerrilla struggle in the Sierra Maestra mountains. He also underscored Valdés’s close ideological and personal bond with Ciro Redondo, second-in-command of Column No. 8, and with Ernesto “Che” Guevara — a bond that made Valdés a brother in arms to Guevara throughout the invasion of western Cuba and the decisive Las Villas campaign, which culminated in the landmark victory at the Battle of Santa Clara that sealed the revolution’s success.

Díaz-Canel further recalled that it was this long-standing loyalty and affinity that led Fidel Castro to task Valdés with leading the mission to locate and recover the remains of Che Guevara and his fallen comrades in Bolivia, before transferring their remains to their final resting place in Santa Clara — a assignment Valdés completed with the same meticulous, exemplary dedication that defined all his work for the revolution.

“Ramiro’s life was a lesson in history and moral purpose. He earned the title of hero through his every action, and he never wavered in his absolute faith and loyalty to Fidel and Raúl,” Díaz-Canel said. “His extraordinary life teaches us that the revolution is built on humility and unshakable conviction in ultimate victory.”

The formal burial proceedings opened with the playing of the Cuban National Anthem. Following the president’s address, Valdés’s funeral urn was transferred to a hearse bound for the Mausoleum of the Las Villas Front Combatants, where his mortal remains will be interred alongside fighters of the Reinforcement Detachment commanded by Che Guevara.

The procession carried the two stars marking Valdés’s status as a Hero of the Republic of Cuba and a Hero of Labor, alongside the many decorations and honors he earned for his decades of exceptional service. Resting closest to the urn was a folded Cuban flag, the same flag Valdés brought back from Bolivia along with Guevara’s remains, which he kept close to him for the rest of his life.

Members of the Ceremonial Unit of the Cuban Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior marched alongside the procession to the mausoleum, to the notes of “El Invasor” — the anthem that commemorates the epic history of Column 8 Ciro Redondo, where Valdés served as second-in-command under Guevara.

After Valdés’s ossuary was placed in its final resting place, the first niche of the first row of the Vanguard block, positioned to the right of the eternal flame that Valdés himself lit at the mausoleum’s inauguration on October 8, 2009, three rifle volleys were fired to honor the iconic revolutionary. Following the sounding of Taps, relatives of Valdés — who bore the legacy of being a hero of Moncada, the Granma expedition, and the Sierra Maestra struggle — alongside top revolutionary leaders, laid white roses at the gravesite. The moving moment concluded with a shared embrace between President Díaz-Canel and Valdés’s widow, Alicia Alonso Becerra.

In attendance alongside the national leadership were Esteban Lazo Hernández, President of the National Assembly of People’s Power and the Council of State; Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, Cuba’s Minister of Foreign Affairs; Gladys Martínez Verdecia, First Secretary of the Provincial Committee of the Party in Artemisa; Rebel Army Commander José Ramón Machado Ventura; members of the Secretariat of the Central Committee; and other senior state and government leaders, joined by the highest provincial authorities of Villa Clara.

In a final reflection on Valdés’s legacy, the event reaffirmed that while the iconic revolutionary never sought the spotlight in the extraordinary project of the Cuban revolution, his place as a central protagonist of the nation’s liberation struggle is secure forever, and his example will continue to shape Cuba for generations to come.

On June 25, 2026 — a year marking the centennial of Fidel Castro Ruz, the Commander-in-Chief of the Cuban Revolution — Cuba gathered in Santa Clara’s Ernesto Che Guevara Sculptural Complex to inter the remains of one of its most iconic revolutionary leaders, Ramiro Valdés Menéndez. Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic, delivered a moving eulogy honoring the life and legacy of the revolutionary commander at the interment ceremony, held at the Las Villas Front Mausoleum.

Valdés now rests in the historic city he helped liberate as a member of the rebel vanguard led by Che Guevara decades earlier. It is a fitting resting place: the memorial complex where he is interred was a project he oversaw from its earliest planning to its final completion, and it was here that he joined Fidel Castro and Raúl Castro to lay Che Guevara’s remains to rest decades ago. For years, he returned to this mausoleum every time he visited Santa Clara to pay tribute to his fallen comrades-in-arms.

Born into deep poverty in Artemisa’s La Matilde neighborhood, in a home with a dirt floor and cardboard roof that leaked heavier during storms than outside, Valdés inherited unshakable values from his mother Ofelia Menéndez, a follower of Cuban independence icon José Martí. She taught him dignity, honesty, and pride in his humble, upright roots — values that would guide every decision of his 70-plus years of revolutionary service. When Fulgencio Batista seized power in a 1952 coup, a young Valdés immediately aligned with Fidel Castro, drawn to the revolutionary leader’s vision for a free and just Cuba.

Valdés’ place in Cuban revolutionary history was cemented early: he was the first fighter to breach the gates during the 1953 attack on the Moncada Barracks, where he sustained a bullet wound he would later remove himself with a field knife while hiding in the Sierra Maestra mountains. From imprisonment on the Isle of Pines to exile in Mexico, from the historic Granma expedition to the chaotic aftermath of the Alegría de Pío defeat, Valdés never wavered in his commitment to the revolutionary cause. His absolute faith in Fidel and the fight for Cuban sovereignty became his defining trait.

In the Sierra Maestra, Valdés rose to the rank of Commander and served as second-in-command of Che Guevara’s Column 8 during the legendary Western Invasion, a campaign he dreamed of leading as a child reading stories of Cuba’s 19th-century independence fighters. He forged two unbreakable bonds during these years: one with childhood friend and fellow conspirator Ciro Redondo, whose death in the Battle of Mar Verde left a permanent wound, and another with Che Guevara himself. The pair became ideological brothers, and Fidel Castro trusted Valdés so deeply that he assigned him to protect Che’s life. When Che was killed in Bolivia, Valdés led the mission to recover his remains and bring him home to Cuba, once writing that if he had accompanied Che, the world would have been searching for both of them — a testament to a brotherhood that outlasted death.

After the 1959 revolutionary triumph, Valdés took on the monumental task of building Cuba’s State Security apparatus from scratch, starting with just three staff members in a single office in Ciudad Libertad. Operating under his motto that the work of defending the revolution must be done in silence, he served as Minister of the Interior, countering CIA conspiracies, foiling assassination plots against Fidel, quelling counterrevolutionary banditry in the Escambray Mountains, and blocking every form of imperial aggression. Later, as Vice President of the Councils of State and Ministers, he oversaw strategic core sectors including telecommunications, energy, construction and mining. A self-taught leader without an engineering degree, he studied relentlessly to master his portfolio, proving revolutionary commitment could overcome any obstacle.

Beyond his official roles, Valdés embodied the quiet discipline and humility that defined Cuba’s founding revolutionary generation. He maintained a rigorous daily fitness routine well into his 90s, believing that revolutionaries must stay physically and mentally prepared to serve the nation at all times. He rejected public attention and personal glory, seeing only the fulfillment of duty to the Cuban people as his life’s purpose. This modesty and lack of vanity earned him deep affection and respect across the island. Just months before his death, when he did not appear at public events including the inauguration of new solar energy parks, ordinary Cubans across the country began asking: Where is Ramiro?

Throughout his life, Valdés’ unwavering loyalty was anchored to the ideals of Fidel Castro and Raúl Castro, a loyalty born of decades of shared struggle and common vision for Cuban sovereignty and social justice. He was a steadfast supporter of generational transition under Raúl’s leadership, and mentored a new generation of revolutionary leaders including Díaz-Canel himself. Though his reserved demeanor often masked his warmth, those who knew him recalled a man of deep tenderness: a devoted husband to his wife Alicia, his partner of more than five decades, and a loving father who passed on the values of honesty and revolutionary commitment to his children and grandchildren. As Valdés himself often said, “History shows, at least Cuban history, that to be a revolutionary you have to be romantic, idealistic and in love, first and foremost with the Revolution, that’s how it is, there is no other way.”

Closing his eulogy, Díaz-Canel rejected the traditional call for peaceful rest, echoing words written for Che Guevara’s 1997 interment at the same site. The mausoleum that holds Valdés’ remains will always be more than a resting place, Díaz-Canel said: it is a trench, a battlefield, a camp for the ongoing fight for the Cuban people. It is a fitting legacy for a fighter who never stopped serving his nation until his final days. To Ramiro Valdés, Díaz-Canel said, the Cuban people owe eternal gratitude for his dedication, his commitment, and his unwavering example. Always onward to victory.

In a formal statement delivered at a regular press briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun has issued a clear rebuke of unlawful unilateral sanctions, reinforcing Beijing’s long-standing position that such coercive measures lack any grounding in international legal frameworks.

Guo’s comments came in direct response to new restrictive measures unveiled by the U.S. State Department on June 23, which targeted five Cuban entities and one individual over unsubstantiated claims that they generate illicit revenue for the Cuban government.

Against this backdrop, the spokesman urged Washington to take immediate action to terminate its decades-long economic blockade of Cuba, as well as halt all other forms of coercive pressure targeting the island nation. He emphasized that the long-running U.S. embargo has systematically undermined the fundamental rights of the Cuban people to access basic resources, sustain livelihoods, and pursue long-term development, calling on U.S. authorities to end these violations immediately.

Beyond addressing the latest sanctions, Guo reaffirmed China’s unwavering support for Cuba’s sovereign right to chart its own developmental path. Specifically, Beijing backs Cuba’s efforts to pursue a socialist development model tailored to its unique national circumstances, and stands firmly with the island in defending its territorial integrity, national sovereignty, and domestic security. The spokesman also reiterated China’s consistent opposition to any form of external interference in Cuba’s internal affairs.

This latest statement from Beijing aligns with China’s long-held public stance on the U.S. embargo. For decades, China has repeatedly condemned Washington’s more than 60-year economic blockade of Cuba— which has been accompanied by growing coercive measures and heightened military threats in recent years—across multiple international forums and in official government communications.

HAVANA, June 24 – A top leader of Cuba’s ruling Communist Party has publicly condemned long-standing United States policy toward his country, saying Washington’s end goal is to achieve complete political and economic domination over the Caribbean island. Roberto Morales Ojeda, who serves as a member of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party Central Committee and the body’s Organization Secretary, made the accusation in a post published to his official Facebook profile, echoing longstanding Cuban pushback against decades of U.S. pressure.

Havana, June 24, 2026 – Cuba’s highest governing bodies have advanced a landmark set of economic and social adjustments that will soon be made public in full, wrapping up a years-long process of refining the island nation’s development framework.

The Council of Ministers is scheduled to hold a formal analysis of the proposed transformations this week, building on a multi-stage review process that already incorporated input from two key national bodies: the Political Bureau of Cuba’s Communist Party, and participants in the Extraordinary Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee. The reforms also received debate and endorsement during the 3rd Extraordinary Session of the 10th Legislature of the National Assembly of People’s Power, ensuring broad institutional input before finalization.

These adjustments are framed as a deliberate, sovereign policy choice for Cuba, emerging from a decades-long initiative to update and optimize the Cuban Economic Model. That process was first launched in 2011, with major deepening of reform efforts kicking off in 2021 as the country addressed shifting global and domestic economic conditions. Once the Council of Ministers concludes its final analysis, the full text of all approved economic and social transformations will be released publicly to bring transparency to the country’s latest policy evolution.

On a Tuesday morning in June 2026, one of the last surviving core figures of Cuba’s revolutionary movement, Commander of the Revolution Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, received his first formal tribute from the country’s top political and military leadership at the headquarters of the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces. Leading the honor guard for the lifelong revolutionary was Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, leader of the Cuban Revolution and Valdés Menéndez’s comrade-in-arms spanning decades of struggle from the Moncada Barracks attack to the Granma expedition, the guerrilla campaign in the Sierra Maestra, and the decades of nation-building following the 1959 revolutionary triumph.

Joining Raúl in the tribute were Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and President of the Republic of Cuba; Army Corps General Álvaro López Miera, Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces; and Army Corps General Lázaro Alberto Álvarez Casas, Minister of the Interior, both of whom are members of the party’s Political Bureau.

Before the honor guard began, the urn holding Valdés Menéndez’s ashes was placed at the center of the ceremony hall. A revolutionary renowned for unwavering loyalty to Fidel and Raúl Castro, and a man who often described himself as deeply devoted to the Cuban Revolution, Valdés Menéndez left behind a legacy of service recognized across the country. Flanking the urn were the two stars marking his status as Hero of the Republic of Cuba and Hero of Labor, alongside the dozens of distinctions and decorations he earned over a lifetime of exceptional service to the nation. Resting near the urn, folded into the traditional triangular shape, was the Cuban flag that Valdés Menéndez personally carried back from Bolivia alongside Che Guevara’s remains — a treasure he never parted with for the rest of his life.

A second mourning flag, draped with a black ribbon, stood alongside five floral arrangements offered on behalf of Army General Raúl Castro, President Díaz-Canel, the Association of Combatants of the Cuban Revolution, the Cuban people, and Valdés Menéndez’s family. These offerings honored a revolutionary who famously avoided the spotlight, once saying that all the achievements of the revolution were collective work done naturally when duty called, not the triumph of any single individual.

After the formal honor guard concluded, Raúl Castro and Díaz-Canel placed white roses at the urn to cap the tribute, followed by the two military ministers. The pair then offered heartfelt condolences to Valdés Menéndez’s family, including his lifelong partner Alicia, his children, and all attendees gathered to honor the humble guerrilla fighter who gave every part of his life to building the new Cuba born in 1959.

Speaking of the comrade he has long considered a brother, who stood beside him in defense of shared revolutionary ideals and principles, Raúl recalled the words he shared when Valdés Menéndez was awarded the Honorary Title of Hero of Labor: he noted that Valdés held a unique distinction among the revolutionary cohort, serving as second-in-command of the column that Che Guevara led into Las Villas during the final offensive against the Batista regime.

In keeping with Valdés Menéndez’s own final wishes, he will be laid to rest this Thursday alongside his former commander Che Guevara at the Mausoleum of the Las Villas Front, located within the Ernesto Che Guevara Sculpture Complex in the city of Santa Clara.

Though Valdés Menéndez preferred to avoid public attention, his legacy demands recognition as Cuba honors his life. A figure who never sought the limelight, he was and will remain a central protagonist of the extraordinary collective project that is the Cuban Revolution. As Valdés Menéndez himself affirmed, the revolution “was not born to die, but to continue through time” — a legacy he helped build and safeguard for generations of Cubans.

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez has officially declared a national day of official mourning to honor the passing of iconic revolutionary commander Ramiro Valdés Menéndez, via Presidential Decree 1247/2026 issued on June 21, 2026. The mourning period will run from 6:00 a.m. to midnight on June 23, 2026.

Díaz-Canel acted within the constitutional authority granted to the presidency under Article 128, paragraph ñ) of the Cuban Constitution, alongside supplementary powers outlined in Article 125 of the national constitution and Article 24, paragraph x) of 2020’s Law 136, which governs the roles of the Cuban president and vice president. The decree was formally published by the Cuban government and first reported by state-owned Granma, Cuba’s official newspaper of record, on the morning of June 23.

Valdés, a Hero of the Republic of Cuba and Hero of Labor, died on the morning of June 21, 2026 at an undisclosed location, leaving behind a decades-long legacy of dedicated service to the Cuban revolution and the Cuban people. A foundational figure in Cuba’s revolutionary history, he participated in the landmark 1953 attack on the Moncada Barracks, the opening act of the Cuban Revolution, and was one of the original members of the Granma expedition that brought revolutionary fighters to Cuba’s shores in 1956.

He went on to serve as a combatant with Fidel Castro’s Rebel Army in the Sierra Maestra mountains, holding the position of second-in-command of the Column No. 8 Ciro Redondo during the revolutionary army’s invasion of western Cuba. He also fought alongside legendary revolutionary leader Ernesto “Che” Guevara in the decisive Battle of Santa Clara, which cemented the revolution’s victory over the Fulgencio Batista regime in 1959. For his lifelong commitment and unwavering loyalty to the revolutionary cause, Valdés earned enduring respect and admiration from the Cuban public.

Under the terms of the presidential decree, all public buildings and military institutions across Cuba are required to fly the Cuban Lone Star Flag at half-mast for the full duration of the official mourning period. Three senior government officials — the ministers of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, the Ministry of the Interior, and the Ministry of Foreign Relations — have been formally tasked with ensuring full compliance with all provisions of the decree. The document was signed at Havana’s Palace of the Revolution on June 21, 2026, a year marked by Cuba as the centennial of the birth of Fidel Castro Ruz, the country’s founding revolutionary commander-in-chief.