Wife of Cuba's best-known political prisoner confirms her husband is set to be released

HAVANA, CUBA - Cuba&#39;s most famous political prisoner, Vladimiro Roca, is scheduled to be released on Sunday, one week before former U.S. President Jimmy Carter arrives here for a five-day visit, Roca&#39;s wife confirmed on Saturday. <br> <br> News of the coming move was seen as a goodwill gesture by Cuba&#39;s communist-ruled government to Carter, who has emphasized the importance of human rights during his life of public service. <br> <br> Roca&#39;s wife, Magaly de Armas, confirmed in a telephone conversation with The Associated Press that authorities had instructed her to pick up her husband on Sunday in Cienfuegos, the central city where he has been held. <br> <br> ``He&#39;s getting out, but we don&#39;t know at what time,&#39;&#39; De Armas said. <br> <br> Roca, 59, has been serving a five-year sentence that was scheduled to end this July 16. <br> <br> The son of the late revered Communist Party leader Blas Roca, Vladimiro Roca is a former fighter jet pilot who broke from Cuba&#39;s socialist system a decade ago and began calling for a Western style democracy. <br> <br> Roca and three other activists were arrested in July 1997 for publishing a document that criticized Cuba&#39;s Communist Party and Fidel Castro&#39;s government. When they were sentenced in 1999, Roca received the longest sentence. <br> <br> The other three activists were released in May 2000, after serving half of their terms. <br> <br> Spain, Canada, the Vatican and others in past years have asked the Cuban government to release Roca. <br> <br> The decision to free Roca ``is a decision taken at the highest levels of the Cuban government, including the head of state,&#39;&#39; said leading activist Elizardo Sanchez of the non-governmental Cuban Commission of Human Rights and National Reconciliation. <br> <br> Roca ``should have been freed two years ago&#39;&#39; under sentencing guidelines that allow Cuban prison authorities to free inmates before they complete their sentences, Sanchez said. <br> <br> Nevertheless, he said that Roca&#39;s release, coming 72 days before completing his entire sentence, ``has to be interpreted as a rational gesture and one that shows a certain amount of flexibility.&#39;&#39;

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