Facts about Cuba's Fidel Castro

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT FORMER CUBAN PRESIDENT FIDEL CASTRO, WHO HAS DIED AGED 90.

* Castro led Cuba for five decades and was the world's third longest-serving head of state, after Britain's Queen Elizabeth and the King of Thailand, who died earlier this year.

* Holds the record for the longest speech ever delivered to the United Nations: 4 hours and 29 minutes, on Sept. 26, 1960. One of his longest speeches on record lasted 7 hours and 30 minutes on Feb. 24, 1998, after the national assembly re-elected him to a five-year term as president.

* Claimed he survived 634 attempts or plots to assassinate him, mainly masterminded by the CIA and US-based exile organisations. They may have included poison pills, a toxic cigar, exploding molluscs, and a chemically tainted diving suit. Another alleged plan involved giving him powder that would make his beard fall out and so undermine his popularity.

* Outlasted nine US presidents, from Dwight Eisenhower to George W Bush.

* Used to chomp on Cuban cigars but gave them up in 1985. Years later he summed up the harm of smoking tobacco by saying: "The best thing you can do with this box of cigars is give them to your enemy."

* Has nine children from five women. Daughter Alina Fernandez escaped from Cuba disguised as a tourist in 1993 and is a vocal critic.