U.S.: Castro May Be Aiding Power Transfer

Cuban President Fidel Castro, ailing and out of sight, has been meeting with a trickle of international guests in recent months, a U.S. government official said.

The official, who spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive situation with Cuba, said Castro's visitors generally have been from Latin America. The official would not say who Castro has been seeing, but the timing suggested that he might be setting the stage for his departure. A second U.S. government official could not confirm the meetings took place.

In his annual review of global threats last week, National Intelligence Director John Negroponte told the Senate Intelligence Committee that Castro's days "seem to be numbered." He also said Castro and his brother are trying to create a "soft landing" for the regime during the transfer of control.

"From the point of the United States policy, we don't want to see that happen," Negroponte said. "We want to see the prospects for freedom in that country enhanced as a result of the transition" from Fidel Castro.

The U.S. government official said U.S. intelligence agencies believe that Castro probably will die within a month or two, although analysts do not yet know the precise nature of his illness. That assessment narrowed the life-expectancy estimate of U.S. agencies, which previously had said the ailing president was not expected to make it through the end of this year.

The Spanish newspaper El Pais reported on Tuesday that Castro had at least three failed operations and complications from an intestinal infection, leaving him with a "grave prognosis."

The paper had rare details about his medical treatment, citing two unidentified sources from Madrid's Gregorio Maranon hospital, which employs surgeon Jose Luis Garcia Sabrido. An expert in the digestive system, Sabrido flew to Cuba in December to treat Castro and returned insisting that the 80-year-old was recovering slowly, but progressively, from a serious operation.

One of the journalists who wrote the article told The Associated Press that Sabrido was not one of the two sources. The journalist, Oriol Guell, said the sources were both doctors at the hospital, but he declined to identify them.

A Cuban diplomat in Madrid said the El Pais report was false. "If anyone has to talk about Castro's illness, it's Havana," the diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of official policy.

U.S. officials will not disclose how they glean clues to Castro's health. American spy agencies are known to employ physicians to study images, public statements and other information coming out of Cuba and other countries.

Some intelligence officials believe Castro is suffering from diverticular disease, which can cause bleeding in the lower intestine, especially in people over 60. Others believe that Castro has cancer of the stomach, the colon or perhaps the pancreas.

Yet Cuban officials told a delegation of U.S. lawmakers who visited last month that Fidel did not have cancer, and the Spanish doctor who came to check him out said the same.

Havana's public position is that Castro is alive, healthy and will return to power, which U.S. analysts discount. "We are just not seeing reason to believe that he is going to be around too much longer," the U.S. official said.

At last week's Senate hearing, Negroponte said it is an open question whether Castro's passing could trigger a new political situation in which the population could demand democratic reforms.

"What is not known is whether people are holding back — maybe we're not seeing the kind of ferment yet that one might expect to see once Mr. Castro has definitively departed the scene," said Negroponte, who has been nominated by President George W. Bush to be deputy secretary of state.

Pressed further on whether the United States knows what to expect in Cuba, Negroponte added: "We don't know in large measure because it is a repressive society. They've repressed their opposition so severely over all these years, so people aren't exactly speaking up yet."

Despite uncertainty about the future of Cuba, the island's Communist Party retains firm control on the island. The head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, said Raul Castro probably will maintain power and stability after his older brother dies, "at least for the short term."

"Raul Castro has widespread respect and support among Cuban military leaders who will be crucial in permanent government succession," Maples said in his written testimony.