Castro takes responsibility for persecution of gays

Mexico City, Sep 1 (IANS/EFE) Former Cuban president Fidel Castro says he bears total responsibility for the persecution of homosexuals at the beginning of the Cuban revolution.

Castro told Carmen Lira, editor of Mexican daily La Jornada, that the persecution of gays occurred at a time of “great injustice”, and criticised himself for not paying “sufficient attention” to the matter.

“If anyone is responsible, I am,” Castro said, adding that he was “trying to define” the extent of his responsibility for those deeds.

Castro, however, said he doesn’t harbour any personal prejudice toward gays and lesbians.

He said the attacks he suffered during the early part of the revolution disturbed him “tremendously” and complicated some of his decisions.

“Escaping from the Central Intelligence Agency, which bought so many traitors, at times among one’s own people, was not a simple thing. But, in the end, if responsibility has to be taken, I take it. I’m not going to put the blame on others,” he said.

La Jornada reported that homosexuality has been decriminalised in Cuba since the 1990s and free sex-change operations offered on the island since 2008.

The 84-year-old former head of state, who ceded power to younger brother Raul Castro in 2006 after being stricken with a near-fatal illness, also said his country was the victim of “bacteriological warfare” that allowed haemorrhagic dengue fever to come to the island.

“It brought the dengue 2 virus here. In pre-revolutionary Cuba, not even the 1 virus (the non-lethal form of the illness) was known here. Here, the 2 appeared, which is much more dangerous because it produces haemorrhagic dengue which attacks children, above all,” he said.

The virus killed around 150 Cubans in the 1970s.

–IANS/EFE