Cuban cardinal wants political prisoners freed
By ANDREA RODRIGUEZ
Associated Press Writer
HAVANA -- Cuba's Roman Catholic cardinal called for the liberation of
some of the island's 200 political prisoners on Thursday after a rare
sit-down with President Raul Castro, and said he thought his encounter
with the Cuban leader was a "magnificent start" to serious dialogue.
"The church is interested in an alleviation of the situation (of the
political prisoners) - the liberation of some of them, for example,"
Cardinal Jaime Ortega said, a day after he and another church leader,
Archbishop Dionisio Garcia, held a four-hour discussion with Raul Castro
at the Palace of the Revolution, the seat of Cuba's government.
The church has called previously for freedom for the island's prisoners
of conscience, but doing so right after such a high profile meeting was
unusual.
Ortega said in a news conference that he had also brought up the
government's decision to bar the dissident Ladies in White from holding
weekly marches. The group - comprised of the wives and mothers of jailed
political prisoners - were stopped from protesting for three straight
weekends in April and pro-government counter-protesters were brought in
to shout abuse at them.
The standoff ended after Ortega's mediation, when the government agreed
to allow the quiet protests to resume in return for assurances the women
would not expand their activities.
The cardinal made clear that no deal on any prisoner releases or easing
of measures against the opposition had been struck.
"We are not talking about any commitments. We are talking about
conversations with the government, conversations that had a magnificent
start yesterday (Wednesday) and that ought to continue in the near
future," Ortega said.
The meeting was a sign of the church's growing influence on the island.
Garcia, who is archbishop of Santiago and leader of the Conference of
Bishops of Cuba, said it was the first time the head of the bishops'
group has met with the country's leader in five years, when Fidel Castro
was still in charge. Fidel stepped down formally in 2008, turning power
over to his brother.
"It was a very positive meeting," he told The Associated Press.
Garcia said that he thought "that there was good will" on the part of
the government on the issue of dissidents.
A photo of a beaming Raul Castro with the two church leaders was printed
on the front page of Thursday's Communist-party daily Granma, but the
caption said little about what was discussed and made no mention of
dissidents or political prisoners.
The government denies it holds political prisoners, and says dissidents
are paid mercenaries of Washington, which has been at odds with Cuba
since shortly after Fidel Castro overthrew dictator Fulgencia Batista in
1959.
Ortega has waded into politics several times in recent months, telling a
church magazine in April that Cuba was in its worst crisis in years and
that its citizens were clamoring for political and social change sooner
rather than later.
The meeting between Castro and the church leaders comes a month before
Vatican Foreign Minister Dominique Mamberti is scheduled to visit Cuba
for talks on the island's economic challenges and the effects of
emigration and the families torn apart by it.
Mamberti is the first top Vatican official to come since Cardinal
Tarcisio Bertone, secretary of state to Pope Benedict XVI, visited Cuba
in February 2008.
Relations between the church and Cuba's government have often been
strained. Tensions eased in the early 1990s when the government removed
references to atheism in the constitution and allowed believers of all
faiths to join the Communist Party. They warmed more when Pope John Paul
II visited Cuba in 1998.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/05/20/1639365/cuban-president-meets-with-church.html
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