Fidel steps down as Cuban leader

The Cuban president Fidel Castro has announced his resignation after leading the one-party state for half a century. In a statement posted on the website of the Communist party newspaper Granma, he wrote: "To my dear compatriots... I communicate to you that I will not aspire to or accept... the position of president of council of state and commander in chief."

Castro (pictured), who has been in poor health since a stomach operation in July 2006, had indicated in December that he might be ready to stand down. "My essential duty is not to cling to office nor to obstruct the rise of people much younger," he said then.

Now 81, Castro came to power in 1959 after taking a leading role in the revolution that toppled the US-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. He has survived more than 40 years of American sanctions designed to destroy his regime, the only Communist government in the Americas.

The National Assembly, due to meet next Sunday, will elect his successor. It is expected that Raul Castro, 76, who has been a stop-gap acting president during his elder brother's illness, will step aside for Carlos Lage, the 56-year-old vice-president.