Cuba offers to free 52 political prisoners

Havana: The Roman Catholic Church said Cuba has agreed to free 52 political prisoners and let them leave the country in what would be the island's largest mass liberation of dissidents since Pope John Paul II visited in 1998.

Five are to be released into exile in Spain as soon as possible, while the remaining 47 will be let go in "a process that will take three or four months starting now," said Havana's archbishop, Cardinal Jaime Ortega.

The deal was announced following a meeting between President Raul Castro and Ortega. Also participating was visiting Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos and his Cuban counterpart, Bruno Rodriguez.

"We feel enormous satisfaction," Moratinos said in a statement released by the Spanish Embassy. "This opens a new era in Cuba with hope of putting aside differences once and for all on matters of prisoners."

Moratinos then wrapped up his two-plus days here, but did not take any freed prisoners back to Spain with him. He and Ortega said they weren't sure how long it would take for the first five prisoners to be released.

The scope of the agreement "is a surprise," said Elizardo Sanchez, head of the independent Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation. "We were hoping for a significant release of prisoners, but not this."

Ortega said that those to be released were all members of a group of 75 leading political opposition activists, community organizers and journalists who report on Cuba in defiance of state controls on media. They were rounded up in a crackdown on dissent in March 2003.

"I'm so excited," said Laura Pollan, whose husband, Hector Maceda, was one of the 75, and had been serving 20 years in prison for treason - but now could be headed home soon.

But Pollan was also hesitant, saying Cuba may not free as many political prisoners as it says it will.

"I don't think they will let everyone go" I think only some will be," she said in her shabby living room in central Havana. "It won't be the first time that they lie."

Some of the 75 original prisoners had previously been freed for health reasons or after completing their terms, or were allowed into exile in Spain. But at least 52 have remained behind bars - most serving lengthy prison terms on charges of conspiring with Washington to destabilize Cuba's political system.

Church official Orlando Marquez said that by the cardinal's count, only 52 prisoners were left imprisoned from that group.