Venezuela's Hugo Chávez is "optimistic" about September parliamentary elections and "works tirelessly" to support the peace process in Colombia, said his friend and political mentor Fidel Castro, as reported on Friday by some Cuban media.

"Chávez, who visited recently Havana, is optimistic," Fidel said. "He works tirelessly to support the peace process in Colombia," said the Cuban official newspaper Granma, reporting a conversation that the Cuban revolution leader had with the Lithuanian-born writer Daniel Stulin, AFP reported.

"He barely sleeps during the day and works all night," said the Cuban leader referring to the Venezuelan President, as reported by Granma, which said that after Venezuela's parliamentary elections "an opposition that has lost training in the exercise of legislating will return to the National Assembly."