Silence

It’s been a week since news of Fidel Castro’s new health crisis hit the wires.

Last Tuesday La Reforma first published the news that Castro needed more surgical procedures to try to prevent a bout of “fatal septicemia”. The news also claimed that Castro had lost a lot of weight and did no longer want to walk or receive visitors.

The regime’s response: Silence.

The correspondent’s name is Yolanda Martinez. And she’s still in Havana. Still reporting.

Would a regime that kicks foreign reporters out for reporting news unfavorable to the Cuban government allow Martinez to stay in Cuba if she was merely reporting on rumors? If she didn’t have the evidence to back up her claims?

Well, yes, they would-in a heartbeat. But then again, if they put her on the first plane out of Havana, she would be free to spill the beans on all she knows and on who her sources were. Capice?

That could make some high-ups in the Cuban nomenklatura a little red faced - maybe even some with a very famous last name that starts with a “C”.