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Fidel Castro to address parliament after four-year gap

08 August 2010 04:44 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The former president of Cuba, Fidel Castro, is to make his first speech to the national assembly since he stepped down due to ill health four years ago, APA reports quoting BBC News.
If, as expected, his brother Raul attends, it will be their first public appearance together since he became leader of the communist state.
Mr. Castro’s return has sparked speculation about who is in control.
The 83-year-old has said he wants to discuss his allegations that the US plans to attack Iran and North Korea.
A world nuclear war was "almost inevitable", Mr. Castro wrote this week.
Despite his health problems, he is still first secretary of the Cuban Communist Party and has become more active in the last month, giving television interviews and talking in public to selected groups.
If the two brothers do appear together in parliament, observers will be watching their body language closely, reports the BBC’s Michael Voss in Havana.
But the Cuban Culture Minister, Abel Prieto, told the BBC that Fidel Castro was not about to re-enter the government, and only sought to "make Cubans happy".
"I think that he has always been in Cuba’s political life but he is not in the government," he said.
"Fidel is living an active life again to make us happy but he is absolutely not interfering in government matters."
"He has been very careful about that. His big battle is international affairs."
Raul Castro, 79, has himself dismissed any suggestion that there is a divide in the Communist Party leadership over the direction of policy, particularly as his government attempts to liberalise Cuba’s state-run economy.