Fidel Castro loses his right-hand-man as Juan Almeida Bosque dies from heart attack



Juan Almeida Bosque, a comrade-in-arms of Fidel Castro since the start of his guerrilla struggle more than a half-century ago, has died of a heart attack.

A statement in government media on Saturday said the 82-year-old died around 11:30 pm on Friday night in Havana.

One of three surviving rebel leaders who still bore the title 'Commander of the Revolution,' Almeida was a major figure in the battle to overthrow Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, and through the early years following the Jan. 1, 1959, triumph of the Cuban revolution.

Brothers in arms: Juan Almeida Bosque stands with the Castros - Raul, centre, and Fidel right - during a celebration in 1996

Cuba declared a national day of mourning for Sunday and ordered all flags flown at half-staff.

A bricklayer who began working at age 11, Almeida was the only black commander among the rebel leaders. After the overthrow of Batista, he served in several military posts and was often seen at public events in his uniform alongside Castro until the Cuban leader fell gravely ill in the summer of 2006 and finally resigned the presidency in February 2008. Although Almeida also cut back on work in recent years, he was a mainstay at public events beside Castro's younger brother and successor, President Raul Castro.

Almeida joined the fight against Batista's dictatorship in March 1952 as a young law student at the University of Havana, where he met Fidel Castro, another aspiring attorney.

Almeida was at Castro's side a year later, on July 26, 1953, when Cuba's future president led an armed attack on the Moncada, a military barracks in the eastern city of Santiago. It was a disaster and Almeida and both Castros were sent to prison. But that failure launched the revolutionary battle that triumphed five-and-a-half years later.

Passionate: Juan Almeida Bosque talks to a reporter in 1959

Almeida and other survivors of the offensive were freed in May 1955 under an amnesty granted to the young revolutionaries. He accompanied the Castros and others comrades to Mexico, where they formed a guerrilla army.

They returned to Cuba in December 1956 on the American yacht 'Granma' and launched their battle from the island's eastern Sierra Maestra.

Almeida, the Castro brothers and Argentine-born Ernesto 'Che' Guevara were among only 16 who survived the landing, in which most of the rebels were killed by government troops.

'No one here gives up!' Almeida shouted to Guevara at the time, coining an enduring slogan of the Cuban revolution and ensuring his place in Cuban communist history. As a guerrilla leader, Almeida later headed his own front of military operations in eastern Cuba.

Committed: Raul Castro, right, and Vice President Juan Almeida Bosque attend the 50th anniversary of the Cuban revolution in Santiago de Cuba this January

His military exploits earned him the title 'Comandante de la Revolucion,' reserved for top leaders of rebel troops under Fidel Castro's command in the 1950s. Now only Ramiro Valdes and Guillermo Garcia hold the distinction.

In recent decades, Almeida was a highly visible member of Cuba's ruling elite. With his full head of white hair and mustache, he sat on the Communist Party's politburo and serving as a vice president on the Council of State, the country's supreme governing body.

The government statement on his death called him 'a paradigm of revolutionary strength, solid convictions, bravery, patriotism and service to the people.' It said Almeida's body would not lie in state, in accordance with his wishes, and funeral arrangements would be announced later.

Looking well: Juan Almeida Bosque pictured in December 2007

Authorities were organizing a ceremony Sunday in his honor at the monument of Cuban revolutionary hero Jose Marti on Havana's Revolution Plaza and at other locations around the country, including Isla de la Juventud, an island off Cuba's mainland where Almeida once was imprisoned with the Castro brothers.

Almeida also composed traditional Cuban music and wrote about his years behind bars and in the mountains.

Details of his personal life were always closely guarded, and it was not clear how many survivors he had.