Where’s Fidel? Chapter 9,053

The game the Cubans are playing of "will he or won't he?" continues unabated. Raul Castro showed up to assume the leadership of the Non Aligned Movement, but Cuban authorities still won't rule out Fidel appearing at the final dinner.

After acknowledging his brother's illness, Raul Castro launched a stream of anti-American rhetoric in his inaugural speech, saying the world today is shaped by the United States' "irrational pretentions for world dominance."

"When there no longer is a Cold War, the United States spends $1 billion a year in weapons and soldiers and it squanders a similar amount in commercial publicity," he said. "To think that a social and economic order that has proven unsustainable could be maintained by force is simply an absurd idea."

Raul Castro earlier accepted Cuba's three-year chairmanship of the Nonaligned Movement to a round of applause by leaders from two-thirds of the world's nations, saying "Comrade Fidel has asked that I transmit to you his most cordial greetings."

But while Castro is under doctors' orders not to preside at the summit, the iconic leader could make an appearance, Cuba's foreign minister told the assembly.

"Despite the rigor and will with which he pursues his treatment and physical therapy, the doctors have insisted that he continue to rest," Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said. "His health improves continually and his convalescence is satisfactory."

Many are wondering whether the 80-year-old Castro, a living symbol of revolution for many in the developing world, will be able to guide the group formed during the Cold War in its search for relevance in this era of globalization.

Still waiting on any announcement from Air America as well.