Students in Cuba will today re-enact the traditional March of the Torches to pay homage to the National Hero José Martí, on 28 January, the 172nd anniversary of his birth.

Members of youth and student organisations will gather on the steps of the University of Havana, from where they will set off for the Fragua Martiana, the former quarries of San Lazaro, where the teenage Martí was imprisoned for his pro-independence ideas.

The multitudinous night-time torchlight parade – usually attended by the nation’s highest authorities – will welcome 28 January, the date of birth of the man also considered the Apostle of Cuban independence, in 1853.

All the country’s provinces and municipalities will hold similar events, as an unequivocal sign of the new generations’ support for the Revolution, reported the Young Communist League (Unión de Jóvenes Comunistas).

The first of these marches took place on the historic university steps on 27 January 1953 to mark the centenary of José Martí.

That initiative was an act of protest against the crimes of the dictator Fulgencio Batista (1952-1958), who had seized power in a coup d’état a year earlier.