URGENT
Cuba announces first Communist Party conference since 1997
Eds: APNewsNow.
HAVANA (AP) — President Raul Castro is convening a Communist Party congress that could chart the island’s political future for years to come.
The congress will be the first the island’s leaders have held in 11 years. Castro made the announcement on Monday during a Central Committee meeting aired on state television.
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He also announced that he had commuted death sentences for several inmates, but that capital punishment would remain on the books in Cuba.
