A curious coincidence

A curious coincidence

| HAVANA

ON MONDAY evening in Havana, Fidel Castro gave a televised interview, after four years without a public appearance. There was no sign of anticipation on the capital’s sweltering streets—unlike the day before, when everyone retreated indoors to watch the World Cup final, most people said they had no idea Mr Castro was scheduled to speak, even though the programme was given endless publicity in state media.

Those that failed to watch didn’t miss much. The frail but cogent 83-year-old, wearing a grey tracksuit top, seemed far more relaxed than his interlocutor, a government journalist named Randy Alonso. Speaking almost in a whisper, Mr Castro made wide-ranging and convoluted accusations against America: that it had sunk the Cheonan, a South Korean navy ship thought to have been torpedoed by North Korea, in order to provoke conflict, and that its policy towards Iran would lead to nuclear war.

Cuban domestic affairs were not discussed. Their absence was particularly conspicuous given that during the broadcast, seven former political prisoners and their families were traveling to Havana’s airport and a new life in Spain. They are the first of 52 dissidents scheduled to be freed under a deal brokered by the Catholic Church and the Spanish government, in the most important prisoner release in over a decade. Some were given less than 24 hours’ notice that they could leave Cuba. At the airport, Spanish officials were on hand with visas, which usually take months to prepare.

Some dissidents are convinced that Mr Castro’s appearance was deliberately timed to coincide with, and divert attention from, the freed prisoners' departure. If true, such a tactic would serve as a stern warning to those who see change in the air that it remains far off.