HAVANA (AP) — Gen. Julio Casas Regueiro, an accountant who fought in Cuba’s revolution, then used his training to run the military’s lucrative economic enterprises for two decades before becoming defense minister, has died, state television reported. He was 75.
Casas was the most important figure from the revolution to die since Juan Almeida Bosque in 2009, and his death on Saturday of heart failure was sure to focus renewed attention on the fragility of the island’s aging leadership, many of whom are in their 80s.
State television announced three days of national mourning in honour of Casas, who besides being defense minister was also a vice president of the Council of State, Cuba’s supreme governing body.
Casas served under Raul Castro in the rebel army that ultimately pushed out the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in early 1959. Trained as an accountant, he later ran the financial operations of Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces.
“In the past 50 years I don’t remember ever criticizing comrade Julio Casas, save that, as we Cubans say, he’s very cheap,” Raul joked on Feb. 24, 2008, after he was elected to replace his ailing brother Fidel as president.
Among the first things the younger Castro did in the top job was to name Casas defense minister, the post the new leader had held for nearly a half-century under Fidel. In April, Casas was also elected a member of the Communist Party’s powerful 15-member Politburo, which is led by Raul.
Casas’ financial discipline was the source “of his successes on the economic front, among other activities” in the armed forces, Raul Castro said. Casas also effectively led the ministry in the 19 months that the younger Castro served as Cuba’s interim president after Fidel Castro underwent emergency intestinal surgery and temporarily ceded power.
Born in eastern Cuba on Feb. 18, 1936, Casas was an accountant working in a food warehouse when he joined the rebel forces.
Under Raul Castro’s command in the eastern Sierra Maestra mountains, Casas fought numerous battles against Batista’s troops.
He received additional military training in the Soviet Union and fought in Ethiopia.
Today and tomorrow, from 10:00hrs to 16:00hrs, a book of condolence will be opened at the Cuban Embassy in Georgetown. arrest.