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French President Francois Hollande has met Cuba's 1959 revolutionary leaders Fidel and Raul Castro on a historic trip to Havana, the BBC reported.

Mr Hollande also called for an end to the decades-long US trade embargo against Cuba.

He said the embargo badly damaged development of the island.

Mr Hollande is the first French president to visit Cuba since 1898, and the first Western leader on the island since the 1980s.

President Hollande and Fidel Castro spoke for an hour, according to Liberation journalist Laure Bretton who tweeted his comments (in French) after the meeting.

"I had in front of me a man who had made history," Mr Hollande told her.

He later met Fidel's brother and current President Raul Castro.

Speaking earlier on Monday at the University of Havana, Mr Hollande said France would do its utmost to ensure that "the measures which have so badly harmed Cuba's development can finally be repealed."

He was referring to the US trade embargo, which remains in place, although relations between the US and Cuba have improved in recent months.

The diplomatic thaw between Cuba and the US was announced in December.

Mr Hollande announced plans to double the number of scholarships to enable Cuban students to continue their studies in France, as part of attempts to increase academic and scientific co-operation between the two nations.