Even though it occupies a part of the park, the bust of Atatürk, the founder of Republic of Turkey, can be accessed from Malécon like the other statues there. Among the statues, embellishing the Malécon-side border of the Céspedes park, it is the second statue from the left. On a brass plaque, attached to its pedestal, it is written his famous phrase: Yurtta sulh, cihanda sulh (Peace in the country, peace in the world). The bronze bust is the work of the Turkish sculptor Metin Yurdanur, and it was unveiled in 2008. The sculptor is known also by his sculptural work of José Martí in the Park of José Martí in Ankara, capitol of Turkey, erected in 2006.

In Havana, there was another bust of Atatürk in a triangular, little park, bordered by the Linea, street K and street 13. It was erected by the initiative of Gürbüz Çapan, the former Mayor of the county Esenyurt in Istanbul, in 1994. There was a plaque on the pedastal; it is the plaque that is mounted on the pedastal of the current Atatürk’s bust in the Parque Céspedes. Concomitantly, the busts of Atatürk and José Martí were erected in Havana Özgürlük Parkı (Havana Freedom Park) in Esenyurt that was built in memoriam of the warriors of freedom of both the nations. However, in 2007 Atatürk’s bust in Havana was subjected to violence. It was conspicuous that only the bust of Atatürk was splintered and broken off from its pedestal, although the other busts in the same park that belonged to some international personalities, were kept intact. The chief of the police Carlos Fernandez explained that this bust of Atatürk was destroyed by some aggressive Kurdish people during the carnival of Havana in 26 July. The pedestal of this golden bust remained empty for years. 

The bust of Atatürk is the only statue, erected in Havana, that belongs to a politician outside of America.

The special place of Atatürk in the politics of Cuba bases on the admiration of the leader cadre of Cuba to the the revolutionary leader of modern Turkey. When Nazım Hikmet, the great Turkish poet, met with Fidel Castro as the term president of World Peace Council to deliver the Peace Award in Havana in 1961, he told to Castro the Turkish War of Independence and its leader Atatürk. Subsequently, Fidel Castro requested a copy of the book Nutuk (the Speech) by Atatürk from the Turkish Embassey in Havana. The Turkish Foreign Ministry delivered the English copy of the book that the Turkish diplomate Bilal Şimşir found in the National Library in Ankara after a long search. When Fidel Castro completed the reading of the book, his respect to Atatürk, the leader of the first anti-imperialist fight in the world, transmuted to a great sympathy and admiration that he expressed with the words in 1997: ”You (the Turks) don’t need to search for another leader.”