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Havana: Cuban television on Tuesday showed the first images of Fidel Castro in more than five months, broadcasting a silent video of the ailing revolutionary chatting in a garden with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
The 81-year-old Castro looked thinner, and his hair and beard appeared much whiter, in the new video.
He nevertheless looked vigorous and animated as he talked with Chavez and brother Raul Castro.
The green of trees could be seen all around the trio in the video, but it was impossible to determine exactly where the meeting took place.
It was the second meeting two days between the elder Castro and Chavez, who are close friends.
Chavez told reporters about the Tuesday meeting before boarding a flight back to Venezuela in the afternoon. "With Fidel, we conversed nearly three hours yesterday, and almost two hours more today, walking in a garden," he said in images broadcast on Venezuelan state television.
"We were revising the entire plan for energy exchanges and the strengthening of refinery capacity and production of petroleum and petrochemicals," Chavez explained.
Fidel Castro's exact medical ailment and condition have remained state secrets since he underwent emergency intestinal surgery in late July 2006 and ceded provisional power to Raul, who replaced him permanently as president in February.
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