The eldest son of late Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro committed suicide on Thursday after months of treatment for depression, state media reported. Fidel Ángel Castro Díaz-Balart was 68.

According to state-run website Cubadebate, Castro Diaz-Balart was in a deeply depressed state and was being treated by a group of doctors. He had initially been hospitalised for depression and then continued treatment outside of hospital, the portal added.

Castro Diaz-Balart was a nuclear physicist and had been working as a scientific counsellor to the Cuban Council of State and the vice president of the Cuban Academy of Sciences at the time of his death.

He was known as “Fidelito” for his stark resemblance to his father. Fidel Castro, ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2006, when an illness forced him to hand over power to his brother Raul. He died at the age of 90 on November 25, 2016.