Learned Fidel Castro was her father when she was 10 years old.  When she was 12 he told her she was allowed to use the name Castro, but she refused.

Well known for her opposition to her father's government, she absconded from Cuba in 1993 using an altered passport and went into exile in Spain before settling in Miami in 2001.

Had been married three times by the time she left Cuba. Castro attended her first in 1973 and Fernando / Francisco Selgado was her second. Her third marriage was to a Mexican businessman which ended when he returned to Mexico and Alina was not stopped from joining him by Cuban authorities.

Wrote an autobiography entitled Castro’s Daughter: An Exile's Memoir of Cuba in which she described her father as a 'distant dictator'.

Regarding her father's legacy she said  “For Cubans, the legacy of Castro is a country ruined and with part of its people in exile, an experience very hard and very difficult to cure.”