Cuba Ends 9-Day Mourning With Interment Of Fidel Castro

The interment of Fidel Castro ended the nine days of mourning for the man who led Cuba for about half a century.

SANTIAGO, Cuba — The late Cuban leader Fidel Castro was laid to his final resting place in a private funeral on Sunday morning, finally ending the nine days of mourning for the man who led Cuba for about fifty years.

His ashes, placed in a flag-draped cedar coffin, were carried in a military caravan which left the Plaza of the Revolution in Santiago in eastern Cuba passing by thousands of people waiting along the two-mile route of Santa Ifigenia cemetery while waving their country’s flag and shouting “Long live Fidel Castro!”

The interment of Fidel Castro was led by his younger brother and successor, President Raul Castro, who was in his green military uniform as he placed the late leader’s ashes into what seemed to be a niche in his tomb, a simple, grey, round stone with a height of about 15 feet.

The niche was then draped by a plaque bearing the name, “Fidel”.

In attendance to the private funeral were the wife of Castro, Dalia Soto del Valle, other members of his family and presidents Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela, among others.

The officials of Cuba barred the plans made earlier to broadcast the start of the interment live on national and international television, where the international media were prohibited from the event.

Castro’s tomb sat beside a memorial to the rebel soldiers who dies in an attack led by Castro on the Moncada barracks in Santiago on July 26, 1953, and facing the mausoleum of the national hero of Cuba, Jose Marti.

Martial music was hears outside the cemetery before the interment ended.

Although many hoped that Castro’s funeral would be shared to his people but his loyalists and believers said that they understand why it was kept private, saying it was a “family moment”.

Castro succumbed to ill health on November 26 at the age of 90.