http://www.smh.com.au/world/now-he-tells-us-cuba-economic-model-doesnt-work-says-fidel-20100909-153bb.html
Now he tells us: Cuba economic model doesn't work, says Fidel Paul Haven September 10, 2010 Still mentally alert ... Fidel Castro in Havana last week. HAVANA: Fidel Castro has told a visiting American journalist that Cuba's economic model does not work any more, a rare comment on domestic affairs since stepping down from the presidency four years ago. Dr Castro also lambasted Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for his anti-Semitism and denial of the Holocaust. The blunt economic assessment by the father of Cuba's 1959 revolution is sure to raise eyebrows, particularly from his younger brother, Raul, the country's President since 2006. Jeffrey Goldberg, a national correspondent for The Atlantic magazine, asked if Cuba's economic system was still worth exporting to other countries. Dr Castro replied: ''The Cuban model doesn't even work for us any more,'' Mr Goldberg wrote on Wednesday in a post on his blog. He said Dr Castro made the comment casually over lunch following a long talk about the Middle East and did not elaborate. The Cuban government had no immediate comment on Mr Goldberg's account. Julia Sweig, a Cuba expert at the Council on Foreign Relations who accompanied Mr Goldberg on the trip, confirmed the former Cuban leader's comment. She said she took the remark to be in line with President Raul Castro's call for gradual but widespread reform, and a comment on too big an involvement of the state in the domestic economy. The Cuban state controls well over 90 per cent of the economy, paying workers salaries of about $US20 ($21.82) a month in return for free healthcare and education, and nearly free transportation and housing. Since stepping down in 2006 Dr Castro has focused on international affairs and has said very little about Cuba and its politics, perhaps to limit perceptions he is stepping on his younger brother's toes. Mr Goldberg, who was in Cuba at Dr Castro's invitation last week to discuss a recent Atlantic article he wrote about Iran's nuclear program, wrote that ''Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism''. In a passionate defence of Israel's right to exist, Dr Castro, a longtime critic of Israeli government policies, said Jews had been slandered more than any other people and slaughtered for centuries whereas Muslims were not blamed for anything. The former leader criticised Mr Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and urged Tehran to acknowledge the ''unique'' history of anti-Semitism and understand why Israelis feared for their existence. Mr Goldberg also asked Dr Castro what he now thought about his recommendation to the Soviet Union to bomb the US during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. ''After I've seen what I've seen, and knowing what I know now, it wasn't worth it all.'' Mr Castro, 83, stepped down in 2006 due to a serious illness that nearly killed him. The Goldberg interview is the only one he has given to an American journalist since he left office. Mr Goldberg said the former leader's body was frail but his mind was acute. ''And not only that: the late-stage Fidel Castro turns out to possess something of a self-deprecating sense of humour. When I asked him, over lunch, to answer what I've come to think of as the Christopher Hitchens question - has your illness caused you to change your mind about the existence of God? - he answered: 'Sorry, I'm still a dialectical materialist.''' Associated Press, Guardian News & Media
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