Castro Accuses the United States of Promoting the Overthrow of Hugo Chavez

He also highlights the Venezuelan leader’s “heroic and disciplined” attitude towards his illness.

In his latest article “Reflections,” published today in the official Cuban media, Castro asserts that Chavez, “is amused by the baseness and the defamations directed towards him from the spokesmen of the oligarchy and empire,” and says that “the enemy” continues to increase efforts to “discredit and attack” the president of Venezuela.

“I have no hesitation in stating my humble opinion (…) that said oligarchy could never control this country again. Given this, it is disturbing that the government of the United States has decided to turn its attention to promoting the overthrow of the Bolivarian government,” says Castro.

The leader of the Cuban Revolution addresses, “the slanderous idea being promoted that there is some sort of desperate struggle in the top leadership of the Bolivarian government to seize control of the revolutionary government if the president fails to overcome his illness.”

In his opinion, he calls this “a grand lie” and notes that, “on the contrary,” he has observed, “the closest unity of the leadership of the Bolivarian Revolution.”

For Castro, 85 years old and retired from power since 2006, “a misstep on the part of Obama, in such circumstances, could lead to large-scale bloodshed in Venezuela.” He then adds that, “blood is blood — Venezuelan, Ecuadorian, Brazilian, Argentinian, Bolivian, Chilean, Uruguayan, Central American, Dominican and Cuban.”

The former Cuban leader also thinks that “in the near future,” all Latin Americans, and “especially” Cuba, will be affected by what takes place in Venezuela.

In reference to the health of President Hugo Chavez, he points out that, “he has strictly complied with the necessary treatments without neglecting his duties as head of state and leader of the country,” and has done so “with exemplary poise.”

“I would describe his attitude as heroic and disciplined. Mentally, he has not departed — even for a minute — from his duties, sometimes to exhaustion,” said Castro.

The Cuban leader assured that Chavez, a man of “fruitful intelligence,” has, “continued to devote himself to studying and analyzing the country’s problems,” and insists he can vouch for that because he hasn’t for one moment stopped “engaging in contact and exchange with him.”

He also refers to medical cooperation programs between Cuba and Venezuela and the “thousands of centers equipped with high technology equipment” that the Chavez government created “to serve his people.”

“Chavez, on his part, did not choose expensive private clinics to address his own health, but instead opted for the state-owned medical services offered to the people,” Castro added. President Chavez has been constantly traveling to Cuba in recent months to receive treatment for the cancer from which he suffers.