Castro call cheers Cuba officials

Mr Castro seemed frail during his last TV appearance in October

Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro has been in phone contact with Communist Party officials, state-run media say.

This is the first official news about him for 11 days. The party paper Granma gave no details about his health.

The veteran leader handed over control to his brother Raul in July, when he underwent urgent intestinal surgery.

On Friday Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez - an ally of Fidel Castro - dismissed growing speculation that the Cuban leader had cancer.

Mr Chavez said he had spoken with his friend on the phone and denied the illness was terminal.

The Granma article said Mr Castro - who is 80 - had been in contact with provincial leaders, who reacted with jubilant applause when they received the call.

The Cuban leader has not been seen in public for four months, and few details have emerged on his condition.

State secret

The BBC's Stephen Gibbs in Havana says an increasing number of Cubans believe that whatever Fidel Castro's health might be, he seems unlikely to return to power.

Earlier, US director of National Intelligence John Negroponte said Mr Castro was close to death.

"Everything we see indicates that it will not be much longer... months, not years," he told the Washington Post.

Mr Castro's last appearance on Cuban TV, looking frail and wearing a tracksuit rather than his trademark military fatigues, was in late October.

Cubans were told that details of the ailment would be kept secret to prevent Cuba's enemies from taking advantage of them.

The US broke official ties with Cuba following Mr Castro's rise to power in 1959 and has had an economic embargo in place against the island since 1960.