Cuba Has Freed All 53 Prisoners As Agreed In U.S. Deal, American Officials Say

By Matt Spetalnick, David Adams and Lesley Wroughton
WASHINGTON/HAVANA, Jan 12 (Reuters) РCuba has expelled all 53 prisoners it had betrothed to free, comparison U.S. officials said, a vital step toward d̩tente with Washington.
The recover of a remaining prisoners sets a certain tinge for ancestral talks subsequent week directed during normalizing family after decades of hostility, a officials said.
They described a Cuban government’s recover over a weekend of a final detainees on a list as a miracle though pronounced they would keep dire Havana to giveaway some-more people a United States considers domestic prisoners.
The officials, vocalization to Reuters on condition of anonymity, did not contend how many prisoners were expelled over a weekend or brand them. But a White House will yield a names of all 53 to Congress and expects lawmakers to make them public, a officials added.
There had been questions over either Havana would recover all 53 prisoners as partial of a understanding Presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro announced on Dec. 17 to revive tactful ties that Washington severed some-more than 50 years ago.
Intense privacy surrounding a 53, whose names have been funded by both countries, had fueled doubt over Cuba’s intentions and played to critics who pronounced Washington hasn’t pressured Havana adequate on tellurian rights in sell for normalizing ties and relaxation mercantile and transport restrictions.
The U.S. exchanged 3 convicted Cuban spies for an representative who had spied for a U.S. government. The United States also perceived Alan Gross, a U.S. assist workman jailed in Cuba.
The Cuban supervision sensitive a Obama administration over a weekend that a final of those on a list of prisoners had been released, and a U.S. Interests Section in Havana, that handles consular affairs and other contacts for Washington, reliable it, a officials said.
The U.S. officials pronounced they would vigour communist-ruled Cuba to recover some-more prisoners.
“The fact of a matter is there are other people whose cases we have lifted in a past,” one of a officials said. “We have any expectancy of going brazen in a future. We’re going to be wanting to lift a cases of opposite people who might be incarcerated in Cuba for sportive their concept rights.”
Cuba’s supervision says there are no domestic prisoners on a island and typically describes dissidents as U.S.-paid mercenaries.

“WE’LL SEE IN THE NEXT FEW DAYS”
Leading Cuban dissidents pronounced that as of Sunday they had not perceived word that a restrained recover was finish and usually knew of adult to 39 people liberated given Dec. 17, including a renouned hip-hop artist.
“We have listened zero new today,” pronounced Elizardo Sanchez, boss of a anarchist Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation, that monitors detentions. “We’ll see in a subsequent few days if they finish a list.”
Secrecy around a list has done it formidable for Sanchez and other dissidents to endorse a accurate total of those freed.
Speaking in fact on a restrained recover for a initial time given final month’s thespian change in Cuba policy, a U.S. officials pronounced a thought grew out of tip talks on how to recover Gross and how to structure a view swap.
As swell was done and both sides began saying prospects for a broader truce between a aged Cold War foes final year, U.S. negotiators sought explanation of Cuba’s willingness to urge a tellurian rights record and final open presented a list of prisoners they wanted to see released, a officials said.
The Cubans concluded to roughly everybody on a list with a difference of a handful before a names were finalized. In July, they told Obama’s aides that Havana was prepared to recover 53 prisoners, a officials said.
A final public was hold during a Vatican, where any side reviewed a opposite stairs any side committed to take, including a Cuban restrained release, a officials said, and afterwards a broader understanding was rolled out final month after 18 months of negotiations.
One U.S. central also pronounced Obama could practice executive powers “in a matter of days and weeks” to start easing some business and transport restrictions.
The officials pronounced a initial of those changes could be announced around a time of a Jan. 21-22 talks in Havana, when U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson starts high-level negotiations on issues trimming from investments to immigration.
Reopening a U.S. embassy in Havana for a initial time in 53 years will also be a “near-term” concentration for a administration and an emanate that Jacobson will plead with a Cubans, though there is no timeline, one of a U.S. officials said.
This central pronounced a destiny of a U.S. Naval Base during Guantanamo Bay, Cuba – prolonged a bruise indicate with a Havana supervision – was not “on a table” during final year’s talks and that a United States has also done transparent that it will continue a “democracy program” directed during Cuba.
“You don’t erase decades of distrust overnight though we can chip divided during it by holding stairs to urge a relationship,” a central said.
To make a list of prisoners to be released, a United States used information drawn from names of detainees supposing by anarchist activists in Cuba and tellurian rights groups, and gathered names of what it deliberate to be core domestic prisoners who had been jailed for carrying peacefully exercised their rights of leisure of countenance and assembly.
But it is misleading accurately how many dissidents are not on a list. Left out were a names of during slightest 8 Cuban outcast militants jailed on terrorism charges after they attempted to penetrate Cuba with weapons, as good as 20 Cubans jailed on charges of attempting to steal boats or planes.
Also excluded, U.S. officials say, were several Cubans jailed on vague charges of crimes opposite a state, including a handful of people believed to have spied for a United States. (Editing by Jason Szep and Frances Kerry)

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