Cuba celebrates 61st anniversary of socialist revolution

HAVANA - Cubans celebrated on Wednesday the 61st anniversary of the country's socialist revolution.

Anniversary festivities included several concerts and dance performance in the public squares throughout the country.

Celebrations began at midnight with a 21-gun salute at the old Spanish colonial fortress of San Carlos de La Cabana on the eastern side of Havana Harbor.

As is traditional on every Jan 1, the National Ballet of Cuba held a gala at the Alicia Alonso Grand Theater of Havana, where parts of the famous ballet "The Nutcracker" were staged.

"We cubans are winners of the impossible. And this is the right time for us to set out for another exceptionally positive year," Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said on Twitter in English.

On Jan 1, 1959, the uprising army led by Fidel Castro captured the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba and the central city of Santa Clara, forcing military dictator Fulgencio Batista to flee to the Dominican Republic.

The events marked the triumph of the revolution and the beginning of social and economic reforms that led to the establishment of socialism on the Caribbean island.