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Ecuador’s President arrives in Cuba to support Hugo Chavez

Chavez arrived in Havana earlier Monday

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

HAVANA, December 11 (Itar-Tass) – President Rafael Correa of Ecuador arrived in Cuba on Monday to support his close friend, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who will have to take one more surgery for removing a malignant tumor, the Cuban mass media said.

“We’ve come here to give an embrace to him on the part of the Ecuadorean people,” Correa told reporters at Havana airport, adding that Chavez is not alone in fighting with his illness.

Prior to departure for Havana, Correa said on his page in Twitter that “the entire Great Fatherland /meaning Latin America – Itar-Tass/ is standing by his /Chavez’s/ side.”

Chavez arrived in Havana earlier Monday. He was welcomed at the airport by Cuban Prime Minister Raul Castro.

Since last June when Chavez was first diagnosed with cancer, he has taken three surgeries and several courses of chemotherapy and radiotherapy in Cuba.

In spite of the efforts of Cuban physicians, he was diagnosed again with a malignant tumor last week.

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