Cuba to release Prisoners before Papal Visit

December 27, 2011: The government of Cuba plans to release 2,900 prisoners--including a number of political dissidents--as a public gesture in advance of a visit by Pope Benedict XVI.
Cuban President Raul Castro said that the release program was in response to pleas by the relatives of prisoners and by religious leaders. The Catholic Church has helped to negotiate the release of political dissidents during the past year.
President Raul Castro had said earlier that his country will greet the pope "with affection and respect" when Pope Benedict VXI makes the second ever papal trip to the communist island nation in March.

Raul Castro, Fidel Castro's younger brother, on 18 December told a Holy See delegation that Pope Benedict's visit is welcomed "with satisfaction,". Relations between the Vatican and Cuba are tense. Fidel Castro declared the country was atheist, until constitutional reforms made it a secular state in 1992.

Pope John Paul II made the first papal visit to Cuba in 1998. Pope Benedict XVI had said that he plans to visit Cuba and Mexico before Easter, which falls on 8 April.