Cuba's 79-year-old folk singer now armed for an invasion

By Daniel Trotta

HAVANA, March ‌20 (Reuters) - Cuba's armed ​forces ​presented 79-year-old folk singer Silvio Rodriguez with an AKM war rifle and a ceremonial replica on Friday, grateful for his social ‌media post that he was prepared to take up arms ⁠against any U.S. invasion.

Rodriguez has long been a symbol of the Cuban revolution, rising to ‌fame with the "nueva trova" musical ‌style of the 1960s.

"I demand my AKM, if they throw down. And mind you, I'm being totally serious," Rodriguez posted on Wednesday, following a ​series of provocative statements from U.S. President Donald Trump about how he might "take" Cuba and that he could do "whatever I want" with the ⁠country.

Two days after his post, Rodriguez appeared on state television with Cuba's senior military leaders and ​President Miguel Diaz-Canel, who was dressed in green military fatigues.

The AKM, a successor to the Soviet-made AK-47, is the regulation ​rifle of the Cuban armed forces. Rodriguez ‌received a functioning weapon and a framed replica.

Cuba, stuck in an economic crisis and subject to a U.S. oil ⁠blockade, vows to resist any possible intervention from the far superior U.S. military.

"While the threats and perfidy of the United States government repeatedly loom over our homeland... Silvio ⁠hasn't just sung; he has struck like thunder with his earnestly written words - a ​call to national conscience," General Victor Rojo, head of the armed forces political directorate, told the ceremony.

Cuban state television has been promoting the need for military readiness, with near-nightly ‌segments showing adult civilians of all ages and sizes training alongside the armed forces, part of the Communist ‌government's "War of the Entire People" strategy to deploy the masses if needed.

Diaz-Canel has also ⁠shown defiance.

"Faced with the worst-case ‌scenario, Cuba has one ​certainty: any external aggressor will encounter an impenetrable resistance," he said on X.

(Reporting by Daniel Trotta in Havana; Editing by ‌Nia Williams)

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