Most Germans would disagree: The newspaper Hannoversche Allgemeine cautioned against glorifications of Castro in its obit for the former Cuban dictator: “[His crimes are] nearly forgotten among today’s Castro fans, also because Fidel lived longer than many of his victims.”

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The origins of those strongly differing reactions to Castro’s death go back decades. The communist German Democratic Republic (GDR) and Cuba were for years connected by strong economic and cultural bonds, and united against a common enemy: the United States.

The Cuban education system was built on the East German model, and study abroad programs encouraged students to move across the Atlantic Ocean for a limited time. In return, Cuba agreed to grow oranges for the East German market, for instance. The latter agreement nearly caused a diplomatic fallout, however, when East Germans discovered that the Cuban climate was not suited for the cultivation of oranges. Swiftly condemned as “Fidel's revenge,” the tasteless oranges never found much love in the GDR.

One chapter of East German-Cuban history has fascinated historians: The time Fidel Castro symbolically gave a Caribbean island to the GDR as a “gift.”

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In June 1972, Castro made the promise during a state visit to East Germany. Whereas the Germans gave him a furry teddy bear, Castro announced he would dedicate a small island to the German Democratic Republic, according to German public TV channel MDR. The island had previously been renamed “Isla Ernesto Thälmann,” in reference to the former leader of East Germany's Communist Party whose statue became the new landmark.

The island’s beach, quickly renamed Playa RDA (Beach of the GDR), was supposed to become a tourist haven during the cold winter months in Europe’s east — a dream that never became reality.

As economic crises rattled the communist world, East Germans could not afford to travel to Cuba. The “Beach of the GDR” remained uninhabited.

Today, it has become a symbol for the end of communism. When tourists visited the island in 1998, they found Ernst Thälmann’s statue toppled. The symbol of Cuban-East German friendship is assumed to have been destroyed in a hurricane.