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Fidel Castro buried in Santiago de Cuba

The Cuban authorities said earlier access to the cemetery will be opened only after Fidel’s closest relatives finish farewell ceremony

SANTIAGO DE CUBA /Cuba/, December 4. /TASS/. The funeral ceremony of the late Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro has ended in Santiago de Cuba on Sunday as Castro’s ashes were buried at the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery, near the mausoleum of Cuban national hero Jose Marti.

Addressing a rally in Santiago de Cuba on Saturday, Cuban President Raul Castro said the funeral would be modest. Cuban media said the funeral ceremony would be attended by a narrow circle of people. The ceremony started with an artillery salvo. The farewell ceremony at the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery was not telecast live.

The Cuban authorities said earlier access to the cemetery will be opened only after Fidel’s closest relatives finish farewell ceremony.

Fidel Castro died on November 25 at the age of 90. A nine-day national mourning was declared from November 26. On November 30, a mourning procession with Fidel’s ashes set off from Havana to travel across 13 out of 15 Cuba’s provinces, covering a distance of more than 1,000 kilometers. The procession moved in the opposite direction of the Freedom Caravan, the route used by Fidel’s rebel army in January 1959 for a victory march after the overthrow of the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.