Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top security adviser and close ally, Nikolai Patrushev, traveled to Havana this week and met the country’s former leader, Raúl Castro, in what Cuban media described as a “working visit.”
On Wednesday night, Cuban state television showed images of the aged Cuban leader, 91, who is officially retired, hugging Patrushev, who then greeted Miguel Díaz-Canel, the country’s appointed president.
Patrushev, 71, a hardliner who served with Putin in the KGB, the Soviet Union’s intelligence agency, later directed its successor, the Federal Security Service. He later became a general and is currently secretary of the Russian Security Council.
