It’s a familiar trick: When the Castro regime wants something from the international community, it makes a grand show of releasing political prisoners, in hopes of convincing foreign officials that Cuba has liberalized and thus deserves to be rewarded.

As part of the latest diplomatic stunt, Havana plans to exile 52 jailed dissidents. Some of the prisoners have already arrived in Spain, whose government played a key role in brokering their release. Spanish foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos has declared that the prisoner release “opens a new era in Cuba,” and he is now pushing for the European Union to normalize relations with the Communist island.