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Friday, October 22, 2004
Washington declined to wish Fidel Castro a speedy recovery, with officials joking they preferred to hear of a "different kind of fall".Mr Castro underwent three hours of surgery for fractures to his left knee and right arm suffered during his fall at a rally.
He told Cubans he refused a general anaesthetic because he could not abandon his duties as head of state. Venezuela's leader, Hugo Chavez, sent his best wishes. Speaking to supporters in the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, the former paratrooper said his Cuban counterpart made light of the incident when they talked by telephone and quoted Castro as saying "I think I would have made a good parachutist,"
A statement out of the US Capital quoted an unnamed state department official as saying, "We've been looking forward to Castro's fall for years but this isn't what we had in mind."
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