Sawt Falasteen - Cubans bid farewell to revolution hero Valdes

Valdes was one of the last remaining survivors, along with Castro, of the Granma expedition of 1956, when Fidel and Raul Castro and other exiled rebels sailed from Mexico to Cuba to overthrow US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista.

Valdes died on Sunday at the age of 94.

Raul Castro, 95, who was recently indicted by the United States over the 1996 downing of two civilian planes, led an honor guard at a memorial service for Valdes at the ministry of the armed forces in Havana.

Thousands of Cubans joined him at the send-off near Revolution Square.

The Granma expedition marked the start of a guerrilla war that swept Batista from power and ushered in over six decades of socialism.

Valdes was second-in-command of a guerrilla column led by Argentina's Ernesto "Che" Guevara.

He went on to have a long career in both Fidel and Raul Castro's governments, serving twice as interior minister and once as vice president.

As interior minister in the 1960s, he also set up what would become Cuba's feared G2 state security intelligence service.

"There was no one who moved without security knowing it, and that allowed us to infiltrate counter-revolutionary organizations," he said in 2018 in a rare interview with Cuban state TV.

The memorial drew rare crowds in a city that has come to a near standstill since the United States imposed an oil blockade on Cuba in January, compounding a severe economic crisis.

Juan Antonio Rodriguez, a 71-year-old colonel in the interior ministry, mourned the loss of one of the last members of Cuba's old guard.

"At this time, we need Fidel, but well, we don't have him. And soon we won't have Raul, either. But we have to keep fighting," he told AFP.

J.AbuHassan--SF-PST