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CUBA
NEWS
The
Miami Herald
Recuperating Castro expected to maintain
political power
Cuban President Fidel
Castro will have to cut back on his duties,
but few think he will give up any political
control over the country.
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Sat, Oct. 23, 2004.
President Fidel Castro will likely be off
his feet for several weeks recovering from
a fractured knee and arm, but experts said
Friday they don't expect the 78-year-old
Cuban ruler to delegate any authority beyond
ceremonial duties.
Castro's determination to remain in control
became abundantly clear in a lengthy letter
he sent to ''compatriots'' and was read
by radio and TV broadcasters and published
in state-controlled newspapers on Friday.
''From the moment of the fall, I have not
stopped attending to the most important
tasks that I am responsible for, in coordination
with the other comrades,'' he wrote. "I'm
recovering well and will not lose contact
with you.''
Experts on Cuba said the letter was probably
also intended to send a message to those
who may have ambitions to replace the man
who has ruled Cuba for 45 years.
''So long as he is capable of making decisions,
I don't think he will open space for anyone,
not even his brother,'' said Alcibiades
Hidalgo, a former Cuban ambassador to the
United Nations and personal secretary to
Castro's younger brother and officially
designated successor, Raúl Castro.
''And nobody would dare to solicit more
political space,'' added Hidalgo, who defected
two years ago.
While older people can heal well from bone
fractures, Castro can expect several weeks
or even months before a complete recovery,
which will likely require physical therapy,
said Dr. Bruce Troen, a University of Miami
geriatrician.
''My bet is that he's going to have significant
impairment of his mobility and rehabilitative
challenges,'' Troen said. "This will
require more than just getting up and walking.
Even for vigorous 78-year-olds, it's not
so easy to hobble around on crutches and
one leg.''
In his letter, Castro said his left kneecap
shattered into eight pieces, requiring surgeons
to reassemble it during an operation that
lasted 3 ¼ hours. Doctors also immobilized
his left upper arm, which suffered a hairline
fracture.
Throughout the ordeal, Castro wrote, he
used a cellphone to issue orders and refused
general anesthesia so that he could "attend
to numerous important issues.''
''He refuses even to lose consciousness,
losing power in effect, for even a few hours,''
said Hans de Salas del Valle, a research
associate at UM's Institute for Cuban and
Cuban-American Studies.
Should Castro become unfit to rule or dies,
his 73-year-old brother would assume control,
as outlined in Cuba's constitution. Raúl
Castro heads Cuba's armed forces and serves
as first vice president to the Communist
Party and powerful Council of State.
Beyond Raúl Castro, there is no
official designation in the presidential
succession, and Cuba watchers said there
are only a handful of officials who might
fill a No. 3 spot. They include Foreign
Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, 39;
Vice President Carlos Lage, 53; and National
Assembly President Ricardo Alarcón,
67.
Those are the faces likely to become more
visible as Castro recuperates, said Edward
González, a Cuba expert and consultant
at the Rand Corp., a California-based think
tank.
''There will be people stepping into more
ceremonial roles,'' González said.
"I doubt, however, that they're going
to do much else. Castro is going to keep
a tight reign.''
''They have to be very careful of not overstepping
their boundaries,'' he added. "Even
communicating with each other could be considered
a conspiracy to take over. Until Castro
is flat on his back, can't get up or he's
dead, they have to be very discreet.''
Fallout from Castro's fall
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Fri, Oct. 22, 2004.
The Cuban government's confirmation that
Castro fractured his left knee and right
arm in his second public fall in three years
further fueled speculation about the 78-year-old
leader's vulnerability and capacity to continue
to rule.
''That's all anybody is talking about,''
a retired professor in Havana told The Herald
in a telephone interview. "There is
a lot of uneasiness over this.''
Castro's fall occurred Wednesday night
after a speech at a graduation ceremony
in Santa Clara, in central Cuba. He apparently
tripped while walking off stage and fell
hard toward a row of chairs. Although TV
cameras and photographers on the stage recorded
the spill, Cuban television did not broadcast
the fall.
Castro was quickly helped up, took the
microphone and assured a visibly troubled
audience that while he had shattered his
knee and perhaps an arm, he was "in
one piece.''
''The Cuban population was not shown the
fall,'' the professor recounted. "What
we saw was the audience. Some people in
the front row were running. There was a
few moments of silence. Then we saw [Castro]
sitting and talking. He looked very bad.
He was sweating and obviously bothered.''
The confusing footage ignited Cuba's word-of-mouth
grapevine and prompted frenzied calls to
and from the island for a detailed account
of what happened. Even Venezuelan President
Hugo Chávez reached for the phone
in the wee hours to check on his close friend,
Agence-France Press reported.
RUMOR MILL CHURNS
Only those with access to international
TV broadcasts saw footage of the fall. The
rest had to rely on descriptions passed
on from neighbors, friends and relatives.
The government was unusually candid about
the incident, issuing a notice published
in state-controlled newspapers and read
by radio and television broadcasters that
urged the public to remain calm, and offered
assurances that Castro was well enough to
continue with his duties.
Castro later issued a 1,183-word letter
written in the form of a diary. As reported
by Agence France-Presse, Castro said he
had taken a false step and the ''law of
gravity discovered some time ago by Newton''
led to his fall. He called the accident
"absolutely my responsibility.''
He said his kneecap was broken into eight
pieces and that the surgical repair took
three hours and 15 minutes.
National Assembly President Ricardo Alarcón
told foreign journalists in Havana that
he was confident Castro would recover quickly,
saying, "He is a man of much strength.''
State Department officials in Washington
had little to say on the fall, but turned
their noncomment into a jab: ''We, obviously,
have expressed our views about what's broken
in Cuba,'' said spokesman Richard Boucher.
William LeoGrande, a Cuba expert at American
University in Washington, said Havana was
smart to inform the public.
''They certainly couldn't hide this,''
he said. "It's one more reminder that
he won't live forever and, in the not-too-distant
future, politics in Cuba will be politics
without Castro.''
Castro's advancing age became apparent
for many Cubans on June 23, 2001, when they
watched him falter under a scorching sun
as he delivered a televised speech in a
suburb of Havana. He had to be helped offstage
by a phalanx of aides and bodyguards who
rushed to his side and managed to prevent
him from falling.
He has since suffered a string of other
off-camera incidents where he had to be
assisted, experts said, fueling the dread
among supporters and hope among foes that
the end to his rule is near.
''Over the last three years, there's quite
a record,'' of health-related incidents,
said Brian Latell, a retired CIA analyst
on Cuba and Castro. 'Clearly this is a man
suffering from serious infirmities. The
million-dollar question is 'What is he suffering
from?' and will his brother Raúl
and others walk in some morning and say,
'Commandant, it is time that we make some
other arrangements.' ''
INJURIES DOWNPLAYED
Thursday's government statement said a
medical exam showed Castro ''is in a good
general state of health and his spirits
are excellent'' and that he "is fit
to continue working on basic issues in close
cooperation with the party leadership and
the state.''
It added that the exam "Confirmed
what the commander in chief himself anticipated,
that after his accidental fall . . . there
is a fracture in his left knee and a fissure
in the upper part of the humerus of the
right arm.
But that did little to stem speculation
about a future without the Western Hemisphere's
longest-ruling leader, who took control
of the island in 1959 and has since governed
through a communist system.
'People who surround him have got to be
thinking 'What's going to happen?' '' said
Ninoska Pérez, a spokeswoman for
the Miami-based Cuban Liberty Council. "Eventually,
if it's not this fall [that brings an end
to Castro], it will be the next.''
Herald translator Renato
Pérez contributed to this report.
Tumble is the talk of South Florida
Many South Florida Cuban
Americans showed little sympathy for Fidel
Castro after his fall. And some said it
could have been a deliberate stunt.
By Erika Pesantes, epesantes@herald.com.
Posted on Fri, Oct. 22, 2004.
Cuban leader Fidel Castro's fall after
delivering a speech Wednesday was the subject
of many conversations in Little Havana's
exile community Thursday -- and even the
source of some confusion among those who
initially thought the ''fall'' might be
the collapse of Castro's 44-year reign.
In Little Havana, gossip about the incident
spread quickly. ''Se ha caido Fidel'' --
"Fidel has fallen'' -- was the latest
word.
Castro stumbled and crashed into a row
of chairs after delivering a speech during
a graduation ceremony in Santa Clara. He
fractured his left knee and right arm.
Castro's fall occurred while the ceremony
was being broadcast live on state-run television,
but footage of the 78-year-old airborne
as he tumbled was not shown. Shortly after
his accident Castro appeared before the
cameras, his composure regained.
''What he needs to fall from is his throne,''
said Yunzisi Diaz, while at El Palacio de
los Jugos, a fruit and vegetable market
and cafeteria on West Flagler Street and
Red Road.
JUST FOR SHOW?
At Versailles Restaurant in Little Havana,
the regulars surrounded the take-out window,
where Bush-Cheney campaign volunteers tried
to reel in Republican votes amid the preelection
chatter. Across the street, a Florida Democratic
Party Kerry-Edwards campaign base tried
to entice others.
But talk of Castro's accident soon took
precedence -- although one person thought
Castro's fractures shouldn't be big news.
''The fall could just be a show,'' said
Mario Duran, 65.
Others said Castro might be starved for
attention.
''He loves being the center of attention,''
said Vilma Barrameda, 39, "for people
to talk about him.''
Castro's health has been under close watch
ever since he fainted during an outdoor
speech in 2001. This fall is his second
accident in public. ''The third's the charm,''
said 70-year-old Eddy Hernandez, while drinking
his cortadito at La Carreta, just down the
street from Versailles. "These are
good symptoms.''
As she sipped her guarapo, sugar cane juice,
22-year-old Concepción Artiaga argued
Castro's demise is long overdue.
''He doesn't have the capacity to sustain
himself on his feet, much less lead a country,''
she said.
THE BIG PICTURE
And some don't think much will change in
Cuba, but, still, they remain hopeful.
''This is nothing, and he'll continue abusing
and governing Cuba,'' said Reynol Ramirez.
"His fall is symbolic of hope, but
it doesn't necessarily have significance.''
Said Luis Fernandez, a purse vendor at
El Palacio de los Jugos: ''He's really old
already, indisputably, he will die. And
then the people will smile and Cuba will
become the Cuba it was before'' Castro.
No evidence Cuba working on bioweapons,
expert says
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Fri, Oct. 22, 2004.
WASHINGTON - Biotechnology experts who
recently visited various facilities in Cuba
said Thursday that while the communist nation
has sophisticated technology there is no
evidence to support claims it is working
on bioweapons.
''We can't give Cuba a clean bill of health,
but we have no evidence to support these
allegations,'' said Jonathan Tucker, a senior
researcher at the Washington-based Center
for Nonproliferation Studies, an independent
group working to prevent the spread of weapons
of mass destruction.
''They have the capability, but so do we,''
he told a conference focused on whether
Cuba should be kept on the State Department's
list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Cuba's capability to produce bioweapons
has long been a source of speculation.
But serious concerns were raised in 2002
when top Bush administration officials warned
that Havana possessed "at least a limited,
developmental, biological weapons research
and development effort.''
That assessment stemmed from a classified
1999 report compiled by the CIA and its
analytical arm, the National Intelligence
Council. Cuba has denied the allegation.
And a recent U.S. intelligence revision
of Cuba's capability reportedly states that
the U.S. intelligence community has ''lost
some confidence'' in the 1999 assessment.
The revision was part of a so-called world-wide
''scrub'' of intelligence on biological
weapons capabilities in the wake of the
failure to find any of the weapons of mass
destruction that were supposed to be a key
justification for the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Tucker said the Oct. 3-7 visit to four
facilities in Cuba showed the military installations
were producing items such as cartilage capsules
for vitamin supplements and vaccines to
combat life-threatening diseases such as
Hepatitis B.
Castro's fall again raised questions
about his health at age 78
By Nancy San Martin, nsanmartin@herald.com.
Posted on Thu, Oct. 21, 2004.
The Cuban government confirmed Thursday
that President Fidel Castro fractured his
left knee and right arm in his second public
fall in three years, again raising the issue
of the 78-year-old leader's vulnerability
and capacity to continue to rule.
Castro has also suffered a string of other
off-camera incidents where he had to be
assisted, experts said, fueling dread among
supporters and hope among foes that the
end to his rule is near.
''It's one more reminder that he won't
live forever and, in the not too distant
future, politics in Cuba will be politics
without Castro,'' said William LeoGrande,
a Cuba expert at the School of Public Affairs
at American University in Washington.
The collapse happened Wednesday night after
a speech at a graduation ceremony in Santa
Clara in central Cuba. He apparently missed
a step and fell hard on the stage. Television
cameras and photographers recorded the spill.
Castro was quickly helped up, took the
microphone and assured a visibly troubled
audience that he had shattered his knee
and possibly an arm but was "in one
piece.''
A Cuban government statement Thursday said
a medical exam later "confirmed what
the commander in chief himself anticipated,
that after his accidental fall at yesterday's
ceremony there is a fracture in his left
knee and a fissure in the upper part of
the humerous of the right arm.
It added that Castro ''is in a good general
state of health and his spirits are excellent''
and that he "is fit to continue working
on basic issues in close cooperation with
the party leadership and the state.''
But that did little to stem speculation
about a future without the Western hemisphere's
longest-ruling leader, who took control
of the island in 1959 and has since governed
through a communist system.
''People who surround him have got to be
thinking 'What's going to happen?','' said
Ninoska Pérez, a spokeswoman for
the Miami-based Cuban Liberty Council, who
fielded dozens of radio calls from Cuban
Americans. "Eventually, if it's not
this fall [that brings an end to Castro],
it will be the next.''
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