By Jeff Franks HAVANA (Reuters) - Former Cuban leader Fidel Castro looked downcast and near tears as he listened to a song about his friend and ally, the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, in a news report aired on Cuban state television on Thursday. The unusual report, nine minutes in length on a news program, was the first public glimpse of the impact of Chavez' death last month on the 86-year-old Castro, whom the Venezuelan socialist openly revered and considered his political father and mentor.

Leaders inaugurating public works projects is a staple of Cuba, and a surprisingly spry-looking 86-year-old Fidel Castro has done it for the first time since stepping aside as president in 2006, media here reported on Thursday. The elder of the Castro brothers opened the Havana school for 140 children that he himself had asked be built, said the web site Cubadebate.cu. It showed photos of Castro dressed casually in a navy blue jacket and blue and white checked shirt, talking animatedly to children and adults.

Former president Fidel Castro on Monday eulogized Venezuela's Hugo Chavez as "the best friend Cuba ever had," in his first remarks since the death of his protege and his country's longtime benefactor. Writing in the daily Granma newspaper, Castro eulogized Chavez, who died last week, as "an unforgettable friend" who "did not even himself realize just how great he was." "Even though we knew the critical state of his health, the news (of Chavez's death) was a heavy blow," the revolutionary icon wrote in a brief newspaper column.

Fidel Castro and the Cuban communist party have given the green light for reforms paving the way for a new, younger generation of leaders in the single-party state, state media said Monday. As expected, Sunday's session of Cuba's National Assembly re-elected Castro's 82-year-old brother Raul to serve a second and final five-year presidential term. But the assembly also promoted Miguel Diaz-Canel, 52, already a member of the Council of State, to a senior vice presidency of that panel, making him the number two figure in the regime.