Thursday, January 18, 2007

QUITO, Ecuador (AFP): Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez rebuffed pessimistic news about ailing Cuban President Fidel Castro, saying here Tuesday that Castro was "doing well" despite some people longing to see him dead.

"Fidel is doing well, I spoke with him more than half an hour by telephone a few days ago," Chavez told Telesur television channel shortly before leaving Quito, where he attended President Rafael Correa's inauguration on Monday.

Castro himself "told the world how he feels: he's dealing with a slow recovery that can't be easy for an 80-year-old," Chavez said.

A friend of the Cuban leader and, like him, virulently anti-American, Chavez rebuffed a report published Tuesday in Madrid's El Pais newspaper that Castro was gravely ill following three failed operations.

Castro dropped out of sight in late July after undergoing gastrointestinal surgery and relegating power temporarily to his brother and Defense Minister Raul Castro, 75.

Since then, Havana has kept strict silence about his health, leading to widespread speculation about his own and his government's future.

Chavez, who throughout Castro's absence from power and public light has often given updates on his health after visiting or speaking to him by telephone, said he hoped his friend, would continue on the road to recovery.

"Some people want to kill him before his time," Chavez said, alluding to the El Pais report, "but in any case, we all have to die sometime."

Regardless, he added, "Fidel Castro has already made history" and become an immortal like Venezuelan founding father Antonio Jose de Sucre, who was killed at 35 "but, continues to live in the mind, the soul, the spirit and the heart of the people of Latin America."

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