No Castro appearance at May Day parade

Hundreds of thousands of cheering workers marched through Cuba's Revolution Plaza on Tuesday but Fidel Castro was nowhere to be seen.

The place where Castro would have watched the festivities — a raised platform under a towering statue of Cuban colonial independence hero Jose Marti — was instead occupied by his brother Raul.

Castro had attended the annual International Workers' Day march for decades. But the 80-year-old communist leader has not been seen in public since emergency intestinal surgery forced him to step down temporarily nine months ago and temporarily cede his duties to his 75-year-old brother.

Last Mod: 01 Mayıs 2007, 16:38