Voters ratify election list

Cubans ratified a slate of parliamentary candidates including Fidel Castro, the ailing 81-year-old leader who has not been seen in public for nearly 18 months.

Only one choice appeared for each post in districts nationwide and there was no campaigning. The Communist Party is the only party allowed, but the government says membership is not a prerequisite for seats in the parliament that rubber-stamps party policy.

About 8.4 million voters were being asked to back 614 top Communists, career politicians, musicians and athletes for posts in the legislature, known as the National Assembly.

Electoral officials estimated that 95% of registered voters had cast ballots as of an hour before polling stations closed Sunday evening.

Castro, Cuba’s unchallenged “Maximum Leader” since 1959, provisionally ceded power in July 2006 after emergency intestinal surgeries and is still recovering.