Former Cuban president Fidel Castro cannot stay away.
Despite a vow to retire from his second career as a columnist last year, the 87-year-old revolutionary — whose interests range from the nutrition benefits of a leafy plant called moringa to the threat of nuclear Armageddon — apparently still has a lot to say about world events.
He published a new essay on Wednesday that took up nearly a full page in the Communist Party newspaper Granma, warning of dire consequences from the conflict in Syria.
He also denied a Russian newspaper report that alleged Cuba caved in to US pressure and refused to grant US National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden transit en route to Latin America, calling it a “paid-for lie.”
“I admire the bravery and justness in Snowden’s declarations,” Castro wrote. “In my opinion, he did the world a service by revealing the repugnantly dishonest politics of an empire that lies and cheats the world.”
Castro left office in 2006 due to a life-threatening intestinal ailment, but for years afterward, state newspapers continued to carry his semi-regular essays called “Reflections.” They were also painstakingly read out in their entirety by serious-faced news anchors.
In June last year, Castro announced that his columnist days were over. He said at the time that his musings, some of which were increasingly brief and mysterious, were taking up valuable media space. However, the famously loquacious leader has been unable to resist the temptation to weigh in on our troubled world.
In April he published a “Reflection” urging restraint amid elevated tensions on the Korean Peninsula. Last month state media carried a letter of his about the seizure in Panama of Cuban weaponry bound for North Korea.
This time it’s the escalating talk of military intervention in Syria that inspired Castro.
“I am compelled to write because very soon grave things will happen,” Castro wrote. “In our time, no more than 10 or 15 years go by without the human race being in danger of extinction.”
“The Empire’s Navy and Air Force and their allies are preparing to begin a genocide against the Arab people,” he added.
In typical Castro style the column meanders somewhat, touching on everything from the US embargo against Cuba and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s tour of a visiting Russian naval vessel, to the crisis in Egypt and our impersonal technological future.”
As the sun sets on another scorching Yangon day, the hot and bothered descend on the Myanmar city’s parks, the coolest place to spend an evening during yet another power blackout. A wave of exceptionally hot weather has blasted Southeast Asia this week, sending the mercury to 45°C and prompting thousands of schools to suspend in-person classes. Even before the chaos and conflict unleashed by the military’s 2021 coup, Myanmar’s creaky and outdated electricity grid struggled to keep fans whirling and air conditioners humming during the hot season. Now, infrastructure attacks and dwindling offshore gas reserves mean those who cannot afford expensive diesel
Does Argentine President Javier Milei communicate with a ghost dog whose death he refuses to accept? Forced to respond to questions about his mental health, the president’s office has lashed out at “disrespectful” speculation. Twice this week, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni was asked about Milei’s English Mastiff, Conan, said to have died seven years ago. Milei, 53, had Conan cloned, and today is believed to own four copies he refers to as “four-legged children.” Or is it five? In an interview with CNN this month, Milei referred to his five dogs, whose faces and names he had engraved on the presidential baton. Conan,
French singer Kendji Girac, who was seriously injured by a gunshot this week, wanted to “fake” his suicide to scare his partner who was threatening to leave him, prosecutors said on Thursday. The 27-year-old former winner of France’s version of The Voice was found wounded after police were called to a traveler camp in Biscarrosse on France’s southwestern coast. Girac told first responders he had accidentally shot himself while tinkering with a Colt .45 automatic pistol he had bought at a junk shop, a source said. On Thursday, regional prosecutor Olivier Janson said, citing the singer, that he wanted to “fake” his suicide
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reaffirmed his pledge to replace India’s religion-based marriage and inheritance laws with a uniform civil code if he returns to office for a third term, a move that some minority groups have opposed. In an interview with the Times of India listing his agenda, Modi said his government would push for making the code a reality. “It is clear that separate laws for communities are detrimental to the health of society,” he said in the interview published yesterday. “We cannot be a nation where one community is progressing with the support of the Constitution while the other