In an article published on April 10, 2007, president Fidel Castro declared, “Orders for Kathleen Cardone’s decision could only have come from the White House. President Bush constantly avoided the issue of the criminal and terrorist character of the accused. He was protected and charged with a simple immigration violation.” ...
Luis Posada Carriles, the White House terrorist
by Salim Lamrani
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from ZNet
On April 19, 2007, Federal Court Judge Kathleen Cardone of El Paso (Texas) granted parole to Luis Posada Carriles, the worst terrorist on the American continent, in exchange for a $350.000 fine. On April 12, 2007 the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals of New Orleans, in a last ditch effort, tried to block the release of the criminal of Cuban origin who had been in custody since May, 2005. [1] But Posada Carriles, responsible for nearly 100 murders, serenely returned to his house in Miami to await his trial, which was to begin May 11, 2007. [2]
The Posada Carriles case strongly undermines the credibility of the U.S. “war on terror.” President Bush, who has declared many times that any nation that protects a terrorist will be considered an accomplice, is now faced with his own contradictions. Indeed, Posada Carriles was tried for illegally being in U.S. He entered in March 2005 aboard the yacht “Santrina” under the nose of the authorities. He was arrested only after holding a press conference during which he boasted of having no fear of the U.S. government, which he loyally served for several decades. The seven charges against him only referred to migratory fraud and false testimony and not his criminal activities. [3]
What about Section 412 of the Patriot Act, which prohibits the release of a suspect “if the release of the alien will threaten the national security of the United States or the safety of the community or any person”? [4] What about UN resolution 1373, adopted after the 9-11 attacks of 2001, which states that all terrorists must face trial?
In an article published on April 10, 2007, president Fidel Castro declared, “Orders for Kathleen Cardone’s decision could only have come from the White House. President Bush constantly avoided the issue of the criminal and terrorist character of the accused. He was protected and charged with a simple immigration violation.” Indeed, Washington, fearing Posada Carriles might reveal secret information, refused to bring up the criminal past of one of their x-agents since, as the Cuban leader pointed out, “to accuse Posada Carriles would be equivalent to accusing themselves.” [5] One of the most ruthless agents in CIA history was involved in too many secret affairs, including the assassination of president John F. Kennedy. Posada Carriles knows too much and his release was the price of his silence.
A bloody terrorist career
Informant for the police during the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, Luis Posada Carriles joined the ranks of the CIA in February 1961 as a member of the 2506 brigade. Trained at the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Georgia, he became an explosives expert and participated in the U.S. military attack at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961. [6] Although he was an official CIA agent from April 1965 to 1974, the Agency maintained “occasional contact with him” until 1976. [7] In 1976, George H. W. Bush, father of the current president, was director of the CIA. Posada Carriles was “of operational interest to this Agency,” [8] which paid him a monthly salary of at least $300. [9]
On June 23, 1964 in a signed declaration to the FBI in Polk City, Florida, Posada Carriles confessed his intention to carry out terrorist attacks against Cuba. “Posada stated that they were never formally given the support of the U.S. government, but they believed that they effectively had the tolerance of the U.S. government since their military training activities had gone on undisturbed.” [10]
On May 17, 1965 the FBI spoiled a plot organized by Roberto Alejos Arzu, a Guatemalan tycoon, aimed at overthrowing the government of his native country. Posada Carriles was among those implicated in the conspiracy along with Cuban exile Luis Sierra López. During the operation, U.S. Customs confiscated a significant amount of arms and ammunition. [11]
Posada Carriles is credited with the organization and implementation of numerous terrorist attacks. According to the FBI, while an agent of the CIA, he received $5000 in June 1965 from Jorge Mas Canosa, then leader of the terrorist cell RECE (Representación Cubana en el Exilio) and future leader of the powerful Cuban American National Foundation (CANF/FNCA), to be used to blow up a Cuban or Soviet ship in Veracruz, México. Posada Carriles told Mas Canosa of his plans to acquire Puerto Rican identification in order to enter Mexico. At his disposal were “100 rolls of C-4 explosives.” [12]
In the 1970’s Posada Carriles was a commissioner in the counter-espionage division of the Venezuelan intelligence service (DISIP) and he participated in the torture and execution of numerous political opponents, unionists and social militants until 1974. [13]
Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch were the intellectual authors of the bloody attack on a Cuban commercial plane that ended 73 lives in Barbados on October 6, 1976. Those killed included the entire Cuban youth fencing team, which had just won first place at the Pan-American Games. According to a secret CIA report written July 22, 1976 entitled “Possible plans of extremist Cubans to blow up a Cubana airplane.” a terrorist group “directed by Orlando Bosch” intended to place a bomb on a Cuban civilian aircraft. A businessman close to the Cuban exile community described as a “reliable informant” had given this information to the CIA. At no time did George H. W. Bush or the U.S. authorities alert Havana to the imminence of the terrorist attack.
According to an FBI confidential report dated October 9, 1976, only three days after the horrific crime, the FBI legal attaché in Caracas had been in contact with Venezuelan Hernan Ricardo Lozano, one of the terrorists who, along with Freddy Lugo, planted the bomb on the plane October 6, 1976. The document affirmed that Lozano was an independent journalist employed “by a industrial security company directed by Luis Posada.” However the report emphasized that Lozano in reality “was in the personal service of Luis Posada.” Lozano had informed the FBI of his intention to attack the Cuban embassy in Caracas. On September 30, 1976 he applied for a visa to go to Puerto Rico to research an article. The FBI noted a strange coincidence in his report:
“In reviewing the passport and application form, legat (legal attache) noted Ricardo [Lozano] ... had traveled from Caracas to Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, on august 29, 1976, and had returned to Caracas on September 1, 1976. Legat recalled that the bombing of Guyana’s consulate in Port-of-Spain had occurred at approximately 10:15 a.m. on September 1, 1976, and wondered, in view of Ricardo's association with Luis Posada, if his presence there during that period was a coincidence.” [15]
The FBI had strong suspicions about the terrorist activities of Ricardo Lozano and Posada Carriles but nonetheless authorized Lozano’s visa. Lozano even indicated to the FBI that he planned to visit Barbados. On October 8, 1976 the FBI learned through a confidential source that Ricardo Lozano had been arrested in Trinidad for the murder of 73 individuals. [16]
A report submitted by the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research to Henry Kissinger regarding the October attack confirmed the culpability of Ricardo Lozano and indicated that Posada Carriles had recruited him into the DISIP and trained him in the use of explosives. “The Venezuelan government is concerned and it would face serious problems if these connections were made public,” the report stressed. [17]
Freddy Lugo was a photographer employed by Posada Carriles’ company. He also worked for the DISIP under the same conditions as his accomplice. The name and telephone number of the U.S. Legal Attaché was discovered in Lugo’s address book upon his arrest in Trinidad. [FBI agent Joseph] Leo claimed that he had never been in contact with Lugo and speculated that Posada had given Lugo his name and telephone number, according to the document submitted to Kissinger. [18]
Then Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez, who was a sympathizer of Orlando Bosch, allowed him free movement in the country, according to the CIA. Andrés Pérez agreed to close his eyes to Bosch’s terrorist activities as long as Bosch promised not to use Venezuelan soil as a base of operations. In this way, Andrés Pérez became an accomplice to the violent murder of 73 innocent people. [19]
The report submitted to Kissinger described the announcement made by Posada Carriles during a fundraising dinner in September 1976: “"Now that our organization has come out of the Letelier job looking good, we are going to try something else.[...] We’re going to hit a Cuban airplane.” He was referring to the murder of Marcos Orlando Letelier del Solar, former Chilean defense minister during the Salvador Allende government. According to the FBI, CORU, an “anti-Castro terrorist organization ”directed by Orlando Bosch and to which Posada Carriles belonged, placed a bomb in Letelier’s car in September 1976. Letelier’s personal secretary Ronnie Moffit, a U.S. citizen, was also killed in the attack. [20]
Another FBI report dated November 1976 confirmed the involvement of Luis Posada Carriles in the attack on the Cubana de Aviación airplane. “Some plans regarding the bombing of a Cubana airlines airplane were discussed at the bar in the Anauco Hilton Hotel in Caracas, Venezuela, at which meeting Frank Castro, Gustavo Castillo, Luis Posada Carriles and Morales Navarrete were present.” Another meeting to plan the crime was held in the apartment of DISIP agent Ricardo Morales Navarrete at the Anuco Hilton that was attended by Navarrete, Posada Carriles and Frank Castro. The Cuban National Liberation Front (FNLC), another “anti-Castro terrorist organization”, according to the FBI, should take credit for the attack. Posada Carriles and his group had also attempted to blow up Cuban civilian aircraft in Panama and Jamaica. [21]
According to the FBI, several members of the Venezuelan government were involved in the attack. Morales Navarrete stated that if Posada Carriles and his accomplices were to talk, “we would have our own Watergate.” Orlando García Vásquez, ministry advisor for security affairs under Andrés Pérez, told the FBI he was convinced that DISIP explosives expert Carlos Fabbri had either manufactured the bomb or was privy to the preparations for the crime. According to the FBI, Fabbri was “a good friend of Posada” and the Venezuelan authorities had arrested the pair previously for supplying false identification and explosives to Orlando Bosch. On October 27, 1976, in an attempt to put a lid on the matter, the Venezuelan government published a statement claiming that Morales Navarrete had never worked for the DISIP and Morales Navarrete instructed his girlfriend in Florida not to call him at the hotel anymore because he no longer officially existed. [22]
One of the first FBI reports about the Barbados crime, published October 7, 1976, categorically stated the culpability of Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch: “Posada and Bosch had engineered the bombing of the airline.” A source had informed the FBI of the involvement of the two Cuban terrorists. [23] After the attack, Hernan Ricardo Lozano called Orlando Bosch to inform him that "A bus with 73 dogs went off a cliff and all got killed." [24]
Posada Carriles was arrested and tried in Venezuela. But with help from the Cuban extreme right in Florida he managed to escape from prison August 18, 1985, while the trial was in appeals. After meeting with Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North in El Salvador he was assigned to the Ilopango airbase where he participated in the terrorist war against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua supplying arms to the “contras.” [25]
Between April and September 1997, a wave of terrorist attacks hit the Cuban tourist industry taking the life of a young Italian named Fabio di Celmo and wounding numerous others. On July 12, 1998, Luis Posada Carriles granted an interview to the New York Times in which he bragged about having committed more terrorist attacks against Cuba than anyone else and claimed to be the intellectual author of the 1997 attacks. He stated that the Italian tourist “was at the wrong place at the wrong time.” When journalist Ann Louise Bardach asked him if he regretted the deed, his response, bursting with cynicism, was unequivocal: “I sleep like a baby.” Posada Carriles confessed that Jorge Mas Canosa financed his criminal activities: “Jorge controlled everything. Whenever I needed money, I asked him to send me 5,000 dollars, 10,000 dollars, 15,000 dollars.” In total Posada Carriles received more than 200,000 dollars from Mas Canosa and CANF. [26]
On November 17, 2000, Posada Carriles was arrested and sentenced to 8 years in prison in Panama for planting 45 kilos of C-4 explosives in an amphitheater at the University of Panama where 2,000 students had gathered to listen to President Fidel Castro give a speech. The then president of Panama Panamá Mireya Moscoso, whose mandate ended on August 31, 2004, pardoned Posada Carriles on August 25, 2004 thus violating Panamanian law, which stipulates that a pardon can only be granted to a prisoner if the judicial process has been completed. However, Posada Carriles’ trial was in appeals at the time. It is now publicly known that Moscoso’s action was meant to please the Cuban extreme right in Miami, where she currently lives, and came after being pressured by Washington. [27]
All this is just a small sample of the terrorist career of Posada Carriles. He has been involved in many other criminal acts, including several attempts to assassinate President Fidel Castro: during his visit with Salvador Allende in 1971, on his trip to Venezuela in 1988 and during the second Ibero-American Summit in Madrid in 1992. He is also responsible for the murder of several Cuban officials in Argentina in August 1976 (Crescencio Galañena Hernández and Jesús Cejas Arias)and collaborated with the Augusto Pinochet’s secret service in Chile in the disappearance of numerous political opponents. [28]
Orlando Bosch
What about Orlando Bosch, Posada Carriles’ accomplice in the tragic crime of October 1976? He is now serenely walking the streets of Miami. But in 1989, Bosch was in imprisoned in Florida. After completing his sentence in Venezuela he returned to United States where he was arrested for parole violation in connection with a 1972 attack perpetrated in the U.S. On July 23, 1989 The U.S. Department of Justice published a report stating that Bosch should be deported due to his international terrorist activities. Orlando Bosch “has repeatedly expressed and demonstrated a willingness to cause indiscriminate injury and death.” In the report, Acting Associate Attorney General Joe Whitley described why Bosch should be deported: “The October 6, 1976, Cuban airline bombing was a CORU operation under the direction of Bosch.” But Bosch was not deported to Cuba like Whitley suggested. On July 20, 1990 he received a presidential pardon from George H. W. Bush. [29]
Orlando Bosch has never denied his terrorist past. On the contrary, he regularly appears boasting in the Florida media. In April 2006, Miami Canal 41 journalist Juan Manuel Cao interviewed Bosch:
Juan Manuel Cao: Did you blow up the plane in 1976?
Orlando Bosch: If I say yes I was involved, I am incriminating myself and if I say no, you will say that I am lying. Therefore I am not going to confirm my participation nor deny it.
Juan Manuel Cao: In this attack, 76 [73] people were murdered.
Orlando Bosch: No, man, in the war that we Cubans who love liberty are waging against the tyranny, planes have to be blown up, boats have to be sunk, one has to be ready to attack anything within reach.
Juan Manuel Cao: Don’t you have any remorse for those who were killed in the attack, for their families?
Orlando Bosch: Who was aboard that plane? Four members of the Communist Party, five North Koreans, five [one] Guyanese. Hell man! Four members of the Party! Who was on it? Our enemies!
Juan Manuel Cao: And the fencing team? The kids aboard?
Orlando Bosch: They were in Caracas. I saw the kids on TV. There were six of them. After the competition, the captain of the six dedicated their triumph to the tyranny, etc. He gave a speech praising the tyranny. We had already agreed in Santo Domingo that anyone who comes from Cuba and glorifies the tyranny runs the same risk as those men and women who fight for that tyranny.
Juan Manuel Cao: Wouldn’t it be difficult for you, if you had to face the families of the victims.
Orlando Bosch: No, because in the end, those who were present must have known that they were cooperating with the tyranny in Cuba. [30]
These were the words spoken by Orlando Bosch with impunity on a TV show in Miami.
The double standard in the war on terrorism
In the eyes of the world, the Bush administration has no credibility when it tries to evoke the “war on terrorism.” The international community will not take it seriously while the U.S. refuses to charge Luis Posada Carriles for his crimes and allows him to enjoy an impunity that is an indescribable offence to the memory of the victims and their families. There can be no exceptions in the war against terrorism.
The U.S. continues to refuse Posada Carriles’ extradition to Venezuela where he is considered a fugitive from justice, under the pretext that he could be subjected to torture. Besides the grotesque and unfounded accusation, it is ironic that a country responsible for the barbarities of Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo is suddenly concerned about the risk of mal treatment. Hugo Chávez has reiterated his petition: “We demand that this terrorist and murderer not be protected but be extradited to Venezuela.” The President of the Bolivarian Republic denounced the double standard in the war against terrorism. “The mask has been dropped once again,” he pointed out, emphasizing the contradictions of the Bush administration. [31] But what else could be expected from the current White House occupant?
Nicaragua denounced Washington’s decision that “promotes terrorism” according to Managua. President Daniel Ortega stated: “In addition to denouncing [the release], I offer Nicaragua as the venue for a trial against Posada Carriles, since he also committed terrorist acts here.” [32]
Ohio democratic Senator Dennis Kucinich also criticized Posada’s release in a letter addressed to Attorney General Alberto González, “If he is released from prison, our credibility in the world will be compromised, as it will be acting counter to our war on terrorism.” [33]
The 118 member countries of the Non Aligned Movement (NAM) unanimously adopted a resolution condemning his release. The NAM expressed “great concern” regarding the “parole” of the “notorious international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles.” “As is well known, Mr. Posada Carriles is responsible for numerous acts of terrorism against Cuba and other countries including the October, 1976 terrorist attack on a Cubana de Aviación aircraft that killed 73 innocent civilians [...]. Despite this, he has been jailed in the U.S. for a simple migratory violation, and Venezuela’s petition [for his extradition] has been ignored. The NAM pressed Washington to respect “the obligations intrinsic to the war on terror by virtue of international law and bring to trial or, when appropriate, to extradite the authors of terrorist acts.” It also beseeched the White House to not offer any “political, diplomatic, moral or material support to terrorism” and to hand over Posada Carriles to Venezuelan justice. [34]
Meanwhile, five Cubans have been languishing in U.S. prisons since 1998 for having infiltrated Florida’s terrorist gangs in hopes of thwarting more terrorist attacks against their country like those of 1976 and 1997. After a mockery of a trial, Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González and René González were sentenced to a total of four life sentences plus 77 years for “conspiracy” and “attempted espionage,” even though there was not a shred of evidence to prove the accusations. Moreover, several high-ranking U.S. military officers, such as Navy Rear Admiral Eugene Carroll, Army General Edwards Breed Atkeson and Air Force Lieutenant General James R. Clapper, stated during the trial that the five were not guilty of espionage. The prosecutor even admitted to the jury, in a surreal declaration, that to prove the guilt of the accused was “an insurmountable obstacle.” Nevertheless, he insisted on the conviction of the five Cubans. The jury accepted his demand without blinking, without posing a single question and without requesting a single clarification. [35]
The U.S. government still refuses to authorize family visits for some of the political prisoners. Adriana Pérez has not seen her husband Gerardo Hernández for more than eight years. Olga Salanueva has not seen her partner René González either. Ivette, René’s nine year-old daughter was forced to wait more than eight years to finally meet her father. The Bush administration has rejected United Nations and Amnesty International petitions demanding a fair trial and an end to the “cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment” the five Cubans are enduring. This humanly intolerable judicial scandal has been completely ignored by the media. [36]
One of the most shameful aspects of the Posada Carriles case is the refusal of the international press to call him a terrorist. Instead various other expressions are used to describe him: “militant,” “Cuban militant,” “anti-Castro militant,” “Cuban exile,” “anti-Castro exile,” “anti-communist militant,” “anti-communist.” Just like the Bush administration, they never utter the proper adjective: “terrorist.” To a certain degree the western media has accepted Washington’s “good terrorist and bad terrorist” doctrine. How else could the media’s handling of the matter be interpreted except as unspeakable and unpardonable complicity with terrorism against Cuba? Posada Carriles’ guilt is evident. [37]
The international press does not consider blowing up a passenger plane in mid-flight and murdering 73 individuals (including women and children) a horrifying act of terrorism… as long as they are Cubans. To them it is an act of “militancy.” Similarly, to organize a wave of bloody attacks against the Cuban tourist industry does not make the intellectual author a despicable criminal but simply an “anti-Castro militant.” The memory of the one of the worst terrorist act on the American continent deserves a little more respect.
The cases of Posada Carriles and of the five unjustly imprisoned Cubans illustrate Washington’s monumental hypocrisy in its “war on terrorism.” It appears there is no limit to the Bush administration’s irrational race toward infamy.
Notes
[1] Associated Press, « Cuban Militant Freed From U.S. Custody », 19 April, 2007; Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «Un tribunal de Nueva Orleans bloquea la libertad a Posada», El Nuevo Herald, 13 April 2007.
[2] Alicia A. Caldwell, « Appeals Court Blocks Militant’s Release », Associated Press, 13 April, 2007; Associated Press, « US Judge Says Cuban Militant Accused in Plane Bombing Should Be Free on Bail Pending Trial », 6 April 2007.
[3] Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «El gobierno trata de impedir fianza de Posada», El Nuevo Herald, 10 de April , 2007.
[4] Public Law 107-56, Uniting and Strengthening America By Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT ACT) Act of 2001, Government Printing Office, 26 October, 2001, Section 412.
[5] Fidel Castro Ruz, «La respuesta brutal», Granma, 10 de April 2007.
[6] Central Intelligence Agency, « Personal Record Questionnaire on Posada », 21 January 1972, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19720417.pdf
[7] Central Intelligence Agency, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 16 October 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761016.pdf
[8] Central Intelligence Agency, « Luis Pozada », 7 June 1966. Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19660600.pdf
[9] John E McChugh, « Subjet: non declassifie », 18 July 1966, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19660718.pdf
[10] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Cuban Representation in Exile (RECE); Internal Security – Cuba; Neutrality Matters », 13 July 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650713.pdf
[11] Federal Bureau of Investigation, «Roberto Alejos Arzu; Luis Sierra López. Neutrality Matters, Internal Security, Guatemala », 17 May 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650517.pdf
[12] Federal Bureau of Investigation, «Luis Posada Carriles. IS- Cuba», 7 July 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650707.pdf
[13] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Liberación de Posada es una hora bochornosa para el mundo», 19 April 2007.
[14] Central Intelligence Agency, « Possible Plans of Cuban exle Extremists to Blow Up A Cubana Ailiner », 22 June 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19760622.pdf
[15] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 9 de October de 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761009.pdf
[16] Ibid.
[17] Harold H. Saunders, « Castro’s Allegations », 18 October 1976, State Department, Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761018.pdf
[18] Ibid.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Ibid.; Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », November 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761102.pdf
[21] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », op. cit.
[22] Ibid.
[23] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 7 October de 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761008.pdf
[24] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », op. cit.
[25] Felix I. Rodriguez, « Testimony of Felix I. Rodriguez Before the Joint Hearings on the Iran-Contra Investigation [Excerpt] », 27 May 1987, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19870527.pdf
[26] Ann Louise Bardach & Larry Rohter, « Key Cuba Foe Claims Exiles' Backing », New York Times, 12 July 1998.
[27] International Herald Tribune, « Four Cubans Pardoned », 27 de agosto de 2004; Anita Snow, «Mireya Moscoso indulta a cuatro anticastristas», El Nuevo Herald, 27 de agosto de 2004; Glenn Kessler, « U.S. Denies Role in Cuban Exile’s Pardon », Washington Post, 27 August 2004: A18.
[28] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Posada Carriles: Prontuario de un terrorista made in USA», 19 April 2007.
[29] James LeMoyne, « Cuban Linked to Terror Bombings Is Freed by Government in Miami », The New York Times, 18 de July de 1990, Section A, p.1; The New York Times, « The Bosch Case Does Violence to Justice », 20 July 1990, Section A, p. 26.
[30] Salim Lamrani, Fidel Castro, Cuba et les Etats-Unis (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2006), p.
[31] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Mandatario venezolano exigió nuevamente extradición de Posada Carriles», 19 April 2007.
[32] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Daniel Ortega anunció que Nicaragua solicitará extradición de Posada Carriles», 19 April 2007.
[33] Deisy Francis Mexidor, «Condenan libertad del verdugo», Granma, 20 April 2007.
[34] Movimiento de No Alineados, «Movimiento No Alineados presenta protesta ante la ONU por liberación de Posada Carriles», Cubadebate, 20 April 2007.
[35] Salim Lamrani, Superpowers Principles (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 2005); Salim Lamrani, Washington contre Cuba (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2005); Salim Lamrani, La guerra contra el terrorismo y el caso de los Cinco (Barcelona: El Viejo Topo, 2005), Salim Lamrani, Terrorismo de Estados Unidos contra Cuba. El caso de los Cinco (La Habana: Editorial José Martí, 20050; Salim Lamrani, Il terrorismo degli Stati Uniti contro Cuba (Milan: Sperling & Kupfer, 2006).
[36] Ibid.
[37] Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «Posada Carriles podría quedar en libertad condicional», El Nuevo Herald, 17 April 2007; Associated Press, « Cuban Militant Posada Posts $250K Beil », 18 April 2007; Ian James, « Lawyer: U.S. Protecting Cuban Militant », Associated Press, 9 April 2007; Associated Press, « Judge Rejects Bid to Delay Bond Order For Anti-Castro Militant », 10 April 2007; Fabiola Sanchez, « Venezuelan military Agents Raid Home of Friend of Anti-Castro Militant Posada », Associated Press, 13 April 2007; Tim Weiner, « Cuban Exile Is Charged With Illegal Entry », The New York Times, 20 May 2005, Section A, p. 14; Reuters, « Castro Accuses Bush of Protecting Accused Bomber », 10 April 2007; Spencer S. Hsu & Nick Miroff, « U.S. Holds Suspects in War Crimes », The Washington Post, 4 April 2007; Jeff Franks, «Anti-Castro Exile Freedom En Route to Miami», Reuters, 19 April 2007; Los Angeles Times, « U.S. Loses Bid to Keep Posada Jailed », 18 April 2007; USA Today, « Cuba, Venezuela Protest pending release of Anti-communist », 11 April 2007; The Boston Globe, « Caracas Demands US Return of Militant », 21 May 2005; Eric Leser, « L’arrestation de l’anticastriste Luis Posada Carriles, à Miami, embarrasse les Etats-Unis », Le Monde, 6 April 2007; Jean-Hébert Armengaud, « Cuba réclame une figure anticastriste arrêtée aux Etats-Unis », Libération, 19 May 2005.
Salim Lamrani is French professor, writer and journalist specializing in relations between Cuba and U.S. He is the author of the following books: Washington contre Cuba (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2005), Cuba face à l’Empire (Genève: Timeli, 2006) and Fidel Castro, Cuba et les Etats-Unis (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2006).
US Prosecutorial Malfeasance in the Case of the Cuban Five
On the «Round Table» Cuban television program, the issue of the manipulation of justice in the case of five anti-terrorist fighters was analyzed
by Dora Perez Saez
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from Juventud Rebelde
«The most important thing that was placed at the center of the attention is what is called «malfeasance» under US law. That has been the constant theme running through the long legal process against the Cuban Five, » said Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada, president of the Cuban National Assembly.
During an interview broadcast on the «Round Table» news/commentary television program on Monday, details were given concerning oral presentations given before a panel of three judges of the US Court of Appeals in Atlanta on the previous Monday, August 20.
On the television program it was discussed how the panel of judges asked both teams —the prosecution and the defense— about unresolved issues. This hearing was part of an appeals process that began in December 2001, given that the law does not set a limit on the time that the judges must make a decision.
Alarcon denounced the malfeasance of the prosecution since the dawn of September 12, 1998, the day that the Cuban Five were arrested.
«They did it one Saturday,» he explained, «so that during that weekend they could not get a lawyer to represent them. That same weekend FBI investigators met with Congressional members of the Miami mafia. Therefore, by Monday, when the Cuban fighters were presented before a judge, they had already been convicted by the press.
«Likewise,» Alarcon added, «on August 20, the judge leading the panel of the Court of Appeals of Atlanta, had to request the district attorney gave him the classified documentation that that the full court had not been provided.»
The member of Cuba’s Political Bureau also commented that during the months in which the world was watching what would happen in the case of the boy Elian Gonzalez, it was not widely known that at the same time there were five detained Cubans in Miami, and that there lawyers requested the venue of the trial be in another city.
«In my opinion,» said Alarcon, «the process against the Five was as a consolation prize that the US government gave to the Miami mafia after it suffered such a terrible blow in the handling of the case of Elian (Gonzalez).»
«The fact of having waited several months to accuse Gerardo (one of the Cuban Five defendants) of conspiracy to commit murder is more proof of the malfeasance of the prosecution. The scandal was such that the Pentagon and the Department of Justice had to make statements acknowledging that nothing done by the men had put the security of the country at risk.
«But to prove positions like these, they needed a terrified and prejudiced jury to get them to concur. And that was what happened in Miami in the case of the Five,» Alarcon concluded.
Correct proceedings by Cuban anti-terrorists’ defense team
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from Granma International
HAVANA, August 28 (PL).—The handling of the case of the five Cuban anti-terrorists continues to receive recognition by members of the international legal community after the hearing in the Court of Appeals in Atlanta.
On August 20, the lawyers for Fernando González, Antonio Guerrero, René González, Ramón Labañino and Gerardo Hernández refuted aspects of the trial from which they were handed down prison terms ranging from life times 3 to 15 years.
The Five, as they are known internationally, were detained on September 12, 1988 and subjected to a political trial in Miami, which concluded in 2001 with them receiving excessive and arbitrary sentences for alerting their country to acts of terrorism organized in Florida.
Richard Klugh, Fernando González’ lawyer, highlighted the interest shown by the Appeals Court judges, which gives them reason to feel optimistic over the future of the case, despite the long period of incarceration.
A similar view was expressed by Antonio Guerrero’s defense, Leonard Weinglass, who detailed the force and validity of the arguments put to the court.
The defense team concentrated on three issues: the charge of conspiracy to commit murder against Gerardo, that of committing espionage against Gerardo, Antonio and Ramón, which were discounted, and also the inappropriate conduct of the judge, which was highly evident.
In the presence of 73 eminent figures from the legal world, the lawyers once again demonstrated the political intent of the U.S. government, represented by the District Attorney’s Office, by sentencing the patriots without sufficient evidence.
In that context, Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, affirmed that any of the DA’s arbitrary decisions in the case of the five anti-terrorists would be enough to annul the trial and the sentences
Among the jurists supporting the case, Paolo Lins, president of the International Lawyers Union of Toronto, Canada, said that the labor of the defense was impressive, while Fabio Marcelli, general secretary of the Lawyers Union of Rome, described it as correct.
Norman Paech, a member of the German Parliament; Paul Bekaert of the Belgian Human Rights League; and Chilean attorney Juan Guzmán, were likewise in agreement with the legal reasons the defense presented against the arbitrary proceedings of the prosecution.
See also:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=CCdGdpeNps8 Video “Mission against Terror”
http://www.antiterroristas.cu
http://www.freethefive.org
http://www.familiesforjustice.cu/interface.en/design/home.tpl.html
http://www.fabiodicelmo.cu/home.asp
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/index.htm
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=7055
http://www.cubainformacion.tv
http://www.cubanradio.cu
http://www.cubacoop.com/cubacoop%20ingles/inicio.html
http://www.cuba-humanidad.org
http://www.saludthefilm.net/ns/index.html
by Salim Lamrani
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from ZNet
On April 19, 2007, Federal Court Judge Kathleen Cardone of El Paso (Texas) granted parole to Luis Posada Carriles, the worst terrorist on the American continent, in exchange for a $350.000 fine. On April 12, 2007 the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals of New Orleans, in a last ditch effort, tried to block the release of the criminal of Cuban origin who had been in custody since May, 2005. [1] But Posada Carriles, responsible for nearly 100 murders, serenely returned to his house in Miami to await his trial, which was to begin May 11, 2007. [2]
The Posada Carriles case strongly undermines the credibility of the U.S. “war on terror.” President Bush, who has declared many times that any nation that protects a terrorist will be considered an accomplice, is now faced with his own contradictions. Indeed, Posada Carriles was tried for illegally being in U.S. He entered in March 2005 aboard the yacht “Santrina” under the nose of the authorities. He was arrested only after holding a press conference during which he boasted of having no fear of the U.S. government, which he loyally served for several decades. The seven charges against him only referred to migratory fraud and false testimony and not his criminal activities. [3]
What about Section 412 of the Patriot Act, which prohibits the release of a suspect “if the release of the alien will threaten the national security of the United States or the safety of the community or any person”? [4] What about UN resolution 1373, adopted after the 9-11 attacks of 2001, which states that all terrorists must face trial?
In an article published on April 10, 2007, president Fidel Castro declared, “Orders for Kathleen Cardone’s decision could only have come from the White House. President Bush constantly avoided the issue of the criminal and terrorist character of the accused. He was protected and charged with a simple immigration violation.” Indeed, Washington, fearing Posada Carriles might reveal secret information, refused to bring up the criminal past of one of their x-agents since, as the Cuban leader pointed out, “to accuse Posada Carriles would be equivalent to accusing themselves.” [5] One of the most ruthless agents in CIA history was involved in too many secret affairs, including the assassination of president John F. Kennedy. Posada Carriles knows too much and his release was the price of his silence.
A bloody terrorist career
Informant for the police during the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, Luis Posada Carriles joined the ranks of the CIA in February 1961 as a member of the 2506 brigade. Trained at the School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Georgia, he became an explosives expert and participated in the U.S. military attack at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961. [6] Although he was an official CIA agent from April 1965 to 1974, the Agency maintained “occasional contact with him” until 1976. [7] In 1976, George H. W. Bush, father of the current president, was director of the CIA. Posada Carriles was “of operational interest to this Agency,” [8] which paid him a monthly salary of at least $300. [9]
On June 23, 1964 in a signed declaration to the FBI in Polk City, Florida, Posada Carriles confessed his intention to carry out terrorist attacks against Cuba. “Posada stated that they were never formally given the support of the U.S. government, but they believed that they effectively had the tolerance of the U.S. government since their military training activities had gone on undisturbed.” [10]
On May 17, 1965 the FBI spoiled a plot organized by Roberto Alejos Arzu, a Guatemalan tycoon, aimed at overthrowing the government of his native country. Posada Carriles was among those implicated in the conspiracy along with Cuban exile Luis Sierra López. During the operation, U.S. Customs confiscated a significant amount of arms and ammunition. [11]
Posada Carriles is credited with the organization and implementation of numerous terrorist attacks. According to the FBI, while an agent of the CIA, he received $5000 in June 1965 from Jorge Mas Canosa, then leader of the terrorist cell RECE (Representación Cubana en el Exilio) and future leader of the powerful Cuban American National Foundation (CANF/FNCA), to be used to blow up a Cuban or Soviet ship in Veracruz, México. Posada Carriles told Mas Canosa of his plans to acquire Puerto Rican identification in order to enter Mexico. At his disposal were “100 rolls of C-4 explosives.” [12]
In the 1970’s Posada Carriles was a commissioner in the counter-espionage division of the Venezuelan intelligence service (DISIP) and he participated in the torture and execution of numerous political opponents, unionists and social militants until 1974. [13]
Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch were the intellectual authors of the bloody attack on a Cuban commercial plane that ended 73 lives in Barbados on October 6, 1976. Those killed included the entire Cuban youth fencing team, which had just won first place at the Pan-American Games. According to a secret CIA report written July 22, 1976 entitled “Possible plans of extremist Cubans to blow up a Cubana airplane.” a terrorist group “directed by Orlando Bosch” intended to place a bomb on a Cuban civilian aircraft. A businessman close to the Cuban exile community described as a “reliable informant” had given this information to the CIA. At no time did George H. W. Bush or the U.S. authorities alert Havana to the imminence of the terrorist attack.
According to an FBI confidential report dated October 9, 1976, only three days after the horrific crime, the FBI legal attaché in Caracas had been in contact with Venezuelan Hernan Ricardo Lozano, one of the terrorists who, along with Freddy Lugo, planted the bomb on the plane October 6, 1976. The document affirmed that Lozano was an independent journalist employed “by a industrial security company directed by Luis Posada.” However the report emphasized that Lozano in reality “was in the personal service of Luis Posada.” Lozano had informed the FBI of his intention to attack the Cuban embassy in Caracas. On September 30, 1976 he applied for a visa to go to Puerto Rico to research an article. The FBI noted a strange coincidence in his report:
“In reviewing the passport and application form, legat (legal attache) noted Ricardo [Lozano] ... had traveled from Caracas to Port-of-Spain, Trinidad, on august 29, 1976, and had returned to Caracas on September 1, 1976. Legat recalled that the bombing of Guyana’s consulate in Port-of-Spain had occurred at approximately 10:15 a.m. on September 1, 1976, and wondered, in view of Ricardo's association with Luis Posada, if his presence there during that period was a coincidence.” [15]
The FBI had strong suspicions about the terrorist activities of Ricardo Lozano and Posada Carriles but nonetheless authorized Lozano’s visa. Lozano even indicated to the FBI that he planned to visit Barbados. On October 8, 1976 the FBI learned through a confidential source that Ricardo Lozano had been arrested in Trinidad for the murder of 73 individuals. [16]
A report submitted by the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research to Henry Kissinger regarding the October attack confirmed the culpability of Ricardo Lozano and indicated that Posada Carriles had recruited him into the DISIP and trained him in the use of explosives. “The Venezuelan government is concerned and it would face serious problems if these connections were made public,” the report stressed. [17]
Freddy Lugo was a photographer employed by Posada Carriles’ company. He also worked for the DISIP under the same conditions as his accomplice. The name and telephone number of the U.S. Legal Attaché was discovered in Lugo’s address book upon his arrest in Trinidad. [FBI agent Joseph] Leo claimed that he had never been in contact with Lugo and speculated that Posada had given Lugo his name and telephone number, according to the document submitted to Kissinger. [18]
Then Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez, who was a sympathizer of Orlando Bosch, allowed him free movement in the country, according to the CIA. Andrés Pérez agreed to close his eyes to Bosch’s terrorist activities as long as Bosch promised not to use Venezuelan soil as a base of operations. In this way, Andrés Pérez became an accomplice to the violent murder of 73 innocent people. [19]
The report submitted to Kissinger described the announcement made by Posada Carriles during a fundraising dinner in September 1976: “"Now that our organization has come out of the Letelier job looking good, we are going to try something else.[...] We’re going to hit a Cuban airplane.” He was referring to the murder of Marcos Orlando Letelier del Solar, former Chilean defense minister during the Salvador Allende government. According to the FBI, CORU, an “anti-Castro terrorist organization ”directed by Orlando Bosch and to which Posada Carriles belonged, placed a bomb in Letelier’s car in September 1976. Letelier’s personal secretary Ronnie Moffit, a U.S. citizen, was also killed in the attack. [20]
Another FBI report dated November 1976 confirmed the involvement of Luis Posada Carriles in the attack on the Cubana de Aviación airplane. “Some plans regarding the bombing of a Cubana airlines airplane were discussed at the bar in the Anauco Hilton Hotel in Caracas, Venezuela, at which meeting Frank Castro, Gustavo Castillo, Luis Posada Carriles and Morales Navarrete were present.” Another meeting to plan the crime was held in the apartment of DISIP agent Ricardo Morales Navarrete at the Anuco Hilton that was attended by Navarrete, Posada Carriles and Frank Castro. The Cuban National Liberation Front (FNLC), another “anti-Castro terrorist organization”, according to the FBI, should take credit for the attack. Posada Carriles and his group had also attempted to blow up Cuban civilian aircraft in Panama and Jamaica. [21]
According to the FBI, several members of the Venezuelan government were involved in the attack. Morales Navarrete stated that if Posada Carriles and his accomplices were to talk, “we would have our own Watergate.” Orlando García Vásquez, ministry advisor for security affairs under Andrés Pérez, told the FBI he was convinced that DISIP explosives expert Carlos Fabbri had either manufactured the bomb or was privy to the preparations for the crime. According to the FBI, Fabbri was “a good friend of Posada” and the Venezuelan authorities had arrested the pair previously for supplying false identification and explosives to Orlando Bosch. On October 27, 1976, in an attempt to put a lid on the matter, the Venezuelan government published a statement claiming that Morales Navarrete had never worked for the DISIP and Morales Navarrete instructed his girlfriend in Florida not to call him at the hotel anymore because he no longer officially existed. [22]
One of the first FBI reports about the Barbados crime, published October 7, 1976, categorically stated the culpability of Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch: “Posada and Bosch had engineered the bombing of the airline.” A source had informed the FBI of the involvement of the two Cuban terrorists. [23] After the attack, Hernan Ricardo Lozano called Orlando Bosch to inform him that "A bus with 73 dogs went off a cliff and all got killed." [24]
Posada Carriles was arrested and tried in Venezuela. But with help from the Cuban extreme right in Florida he managed to escape from prison August 18, 1985, while the trial was in appeals. After meeting with Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North in El Salvador he was assigned to the Ilopango airbase where he participated in the terrorist war against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua supplying arms to the “contras.” [25]
Between April and September 1997, a wave of terrorist attacks hit the Cuban tourist industry taking the life of a young Italian named Fabio di Celmo and wounding numerous others. On July 12, 1998, Luis Posada Carriles granted an interview to the New York Times in which he bragged about having committed more terrorist attacks against Cuba than anyone else and claimed to be the intellectual author of the 1997 attacks. He stated that the Italian tourist “was at the wrong place at the wrong time.” When journalist Ann Louise Bardach asked him if he regretted the deed, his response, bursting with cynicism, was unequivocal: “I sleep like a baby.” Posada Carriles confessed that Jorge Mas Canosa financed his criminal activities: “Jorge controlled everything. Whenever I needed money, I asked him to send me 5,000 dollars, 10,000 dollars, 15,000 dollars.” In total Posada Carriles received more than 200,000 dollars from Mas Canosa and CANF. [26]
On November 17, 2000, Posada Carriles was arrested and sentenced to 8 years in prison in Panama for planting 45 kilos of C-4 explosives in an amphitheater at the University of Panama where 2,000 students had gathered to listen to President Fidel Castro give a speech. The then president of Panama Panamá Mireya Moscoso, whose mandate ended on August 31, 2004, pardoned Posada Carriles on August 25, 2004 thus violating Panamanian law, which stipulates that a pardon can only be granted to a prisoner if the judicial process has been completed. However, Posada Carriles’ trial was in appeals at the time. It is now publicly known that Moscoso’s action was meant to please the Cuban extreme right in Miami, where she currently lives, and came after being pressured by Washington. [27]
All this is just a small sample of the terrorist career of Posada Carriles. He has been involved in many other criminal acts, including several attempts to assassinate President Fidel Castro: during his visit with Salvador Allende in 1971, on his trip to Venezuela in 1988 and during the second Ibero-American Summit in Madrid in 1992. He is also responsible for the murder of several Cuban officials in Argentina in August 1976 (Crescencio Galañena Hernández and Jesús Cejas Arias)and collaborated with the Augusto Pinochet’s secret service in Chile in the disappearance of numerous political opponents. [28]
Orlando Bosch
What about Orlando Bosch, Posada Carriles’ accomplice in the tragic crime of October 1976? He is now serenely walking the streets of Miami. But in 1989, Bosch was in imprisoned in Florida. After completing his sentence in Venezuela he returned to United States where he was arrested for parole violation in connection with a 1972 attack perpetrated in the U.S. On July 23, 1989 The U.S. Department of Justice published a report stating that Bosch should be deported due to his international terrorist activities. Orlando Bosch “has repeatedly expressed and demonstrated a willingness to cause indiscriminate injury and death.” In the report, Acting Associate Attorney General Joe Whitley described why Bosch should be deported: “The October 6, 1976, Cuban airline bombing was a CORU operation under the direction of Bosch.” But Bosch was not deported to Cuba like Whitley suggested. On July 20, 1990 he received a presidential pardon from George H. W. Bush. [29]
Orlando Bosch has never denied his terrorist past. On the contrary, he regularly appears boasting in the Florida media. In April 2006, Miami Canal 41 journalist Juan Manuel Cao interviewed Bosch:
Juan Manuel Cao: Did you blow up the plane in 1976?
Orlando Bosch: If I say yes I was involved, I am incriminating myself and if I say no, you will say that I am lying. Therefore I am not going to confirm my participation nor deny it.
Juan Manuel Cao: In this attack, 76 [73] people were murdered.
Orlando Bosch: No, man, in the war that we Cubans who love liberty are waging against the tyranny, planes have to be blown up, boats have to be sunk, one has to be ready to attack anything within reach.
Juan Manuel Cao: Don’t you have any remorse for those who were killed in the attack, for their families?
Orlando Bosch: Who was aboard that plane? Four members of the Communist Party, five North Koreans, five [one] Guyanese. Hell man! Four members of the Party! Who was on it? Our enemies!
Juan Manuel Cao: And the fencing team? The kids aboard?
Orlando Bosch: They were in Caracas. I saw the kids on TV. There were six of them. After the competition, the captain of the six dedicated their triumph to the tyranny, etc. He gave a speech praising the tyranny. We had already agreed in Santo Domingo that anyone who comes from Cuba and glorifies the tyranny runs the same risk as those men and women who fight for that tyranny.
Juan Manuel Cao: Wouldn’t it be difficult for you, if you had to face the families of the victims.
Orlando Bosch: No, because in the end, those who were present must have known that they were cooperating with the tyranny in Cuba. [30]
These were the words spoken by Orlando Bosch with impunity on a TV show in Miami.
The double standard in the war on terrorism
In the eyes of the world, the Bush administration has no credibility when it tries to evoke the “war on terrorism.” The international community will not take it seriously while the U.S. refuses to charge Luis Posada Carriles for his crimes and allows him to enjoy an impunity that is an indescribable offence to the memory of the victims and their families. There can be no exceptions in the war against terrorism.
The U.S. continues to refuse Posada Carriles’ extradition to Venezuela where he is considered a fugitive from justice, under the pretext that he could be subjected to torture. Besides the grotesque and unfounded accusation, it is ironic that a country responsible for the barbarities of Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo is suddenly concerned about the risk of mal treatment. Hugo Chávez has reiterated his petition: “We demand that this terrorist and murderer not be protected but be extradited to Venezuela.” The President of the Bolivarian Republic denounced the double standard in the war against terrorism. “The mask has been dropped once again,” he pointed out, emphasizing the contradictions of the Bush administration. [31] But what else could be expected from the current White House occupant?
Nicaragua denounced Washington’s decision that “promotes terrorism” according to Managua. President Daniel Ortega stated: “In addition to denouncing [the release], I offer Nicaragua as the venue for a trial against Posada Carriles, since he also committed terrorist acts here.” [32]
Ohio democratic Senator Dennis Kucinich also criticized Posada’s release in a letter addressed to Attorney General Alberto González, “If he is released from prison, our credibility in the world will be compromised, as it will be acting counter to our war on terrorism.” [33]
The 118 member countries of the Non Aligned Movement (NAM) unanimously adopted a resolution condemning his release. The NAM expressed “great concern” regarding the “parole” of the “notorious international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles.” “As is well known, Mr. Posada Carriles is responsible for numerous acts of terrorism against Cuba and other countries including the October, 1976 terrorist attack on a Cubana de Aviación aircraft that killed 73 innocent civilians [...]. Despite this, he has been jailed in the U.S. for a simple migratory violation, and Venezuela’s petition [for his extradition] has been ignored. The NAM pressed Washington to respect “the obligations intrinsic to the war on terror by virtue of international law and bring to trial or, when appropriate, to extradite the authors of terrorist acts.” It also beseeched the White House to not offer any “political, diplomatic, moral or material support to terrorism” and to hand over Posada Carriles to Venezuelan justice. [34]
Meanwhile, five Cubans have been languishing in U.S. prisons since 1998 for having infiltrated Florida’s terrorist gangs in hopes of thwarting more terrorist attacks against their country like those of 1976 and 1997. After a mockery of a trial, Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero, Ramón Labañino, Fernando González and René González were sentenced to a total of four life sentences plus 77 years for “conspiracy” and “attempted espionage,” even though there was not a shred of evidence to prove the accusations. Moreover, several high-ranking U.S. military officers, such as Navy Rear Admiral Eugene Carroll, Army General Edwards Breed Atkeson and Air Force Lieutenant General James R. Clapper, stated during the trial that the five were not guilty of espionage. The prosecutor even admitted to the jury, in a surreal declaration, that to prove the guilt of the accused was “an insurmountable obstacle.” Nevertheless, he insisted on the conviction of the five Cubans. The jury accepted his demand without blinking, without posing a single question and without requesting a single clarification. [35]
The U.S. government still refuses to authorize family visits for some of the political prisoners. Adriana Pérez has not seen her husband Gerardo Hernández for more than eight years. Olga Salanueva has not seen her partner René González either. Ivette, René’s nine year-old daughter was forced to wait more than eight years to finally meet her father. The Bush administration has rejected United Nations and Amnesty International petitions demanding a fair trial and an end to the “cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment” the five Cubans are enduring. This humanly intolerable judicial scandal has been completely ignored by the media. [36]
One of the most shameful aspects of the Posada Carriles case is the refusal of the international press to call him a terrorist. Instead various other expressions are used to describe him: “militant,” “Cuban militant,” “anti-Castro militant,” “Cuban exile,” “anti-Castro exile,” “anti-communist militant,” “anti-communist.” Just like the Bush administration, they never utter the proper adjective: “terrorist.” To a certain degree the western media has accepted Washington’s “good terrorist and bad terrorist” doctrine. How else could the media’s handling of the matter be interpreted except as unspeakable and unpardonable complicity with terrorism against Cuba? Posada Carriles’ guilt is evident. [37]
The international press does not consider blowing up a passenger plane in mid-flight and murdering 73 individuals (including women and children) a horrifying act of terrorism… as long as they are Cubans. To them it is an act of “militancy.” Similarly, to organize a wave of bloody attacks against the Cuban tourist industry does not make the intellectual author a despicable criminal but simply an “anti-Castro militant.” The memory of the one of the worst terrorist act on the American continent deserves a little more respect.
The cases of Posada Carriles and of the five unjustly imprisoned Cubans illustrate Washington’s monumental hypocrisy in its “war on terrorism.” It appears there is no limit to the Bush administration’s irrational race toward infamy.
Notes
[1] Associated Press, « Cuban Militant Freed From U.S. Custody », 19 April, 2007; Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «Un tribunal de Nueva Orleans bloquea la libertad a Posada», El Nuevo Herald, 13 April 2007.
[2] Alicia A. Caldwell, « Appeals Court Blocks Militant’s Release », Associated Press, 13 April, 2007; Associated Press, « US Judge Says Cuban Militant Accused in Plane Bombing Should Be Free on Bail Pending Trial », 6 April 2007.
[3] Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «El gobierno trata de impedir fianza de Posada», El Nuevo Herald, 10 de April , 2007.
[4] Public Law 107-56, Uniting and Strengthening America By Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT ACT) Act of 2001, Government Printing Office, 26 October, 2001, Section 412.
[5] Fidel Castro Ruz, «La respuesta brutal», Granma, 10 de April 2007.
[6] Central Intelligence Agency, « Personal Record Questionnaire on Posada », 21 January 1972, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19720417.pdf [7] Central Intelligence Agency, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 16 October 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761016.pdf [8] Central Intelligence Agency, « Luis Pozada », 7 June 1966. Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19660600.pdf [9] John E McChugh, « Subjet: non declassifie », 18 July 1966, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19660718.pdf [10] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Cuban Representation in Exile (RECE); Internal Security – Cuba; Neutrality Matters », 13 July 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650713.pdf [11] Federal Bureau of Investigation, «Roberto Alejos Arzu; Luis Sierra López. Neutrality Matters, Internal Security, Guatemala », 17 May 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650517.pdf [12] Federal Bureau of Investigation, «Luis Posada Carriles. IS- Cuba», 7 July 1965, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650707.pdf [13] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Liberación de Posada es una hora bochornosa para el mundo», 19 April 2007.
[14] Central Intelligence Agency, « Possible Plans of Cuban exle Extremists to Blow Up A Cubana Ailiner », 22 June 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19760622.pdf [15] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 9 de October de 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761009.pdf [16] Ibid.
[17] Harold H. Saunders, « Castro’s Allegations », 18 October 1976, State Department, Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761018.pdf [18] Ibid.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Ibid.; Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », November 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761102.pdf [21] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », op. cit.
[22] Ibid.
[23] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Suspected Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6,1976 », 7 October de 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19761008.pdf [24] Federal Bureau of Investigation, « Bombing of Cubana Airlines DC-8 Near Barbados, West Indies, October 6, 1976. Neutrality Matters, Cuba- West Indies », op. cit.
[25] Felix I. Rodriguez, « Testimony of Felix I. Rodriguez Before the Joint Hearings on the Iran-Contra Investigation [Excerpt] », 27 May 1987, Luis Posada Carriles, the Declassified Record, The National Security Archive, George Washington University.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19870527.pdf [26] Ann Louise Bardach & Larry Rohter, « Key Cuba Foe Claims Exiles' Backing », New York Times, 12 July 1998.
[27] International Herald Tribune, « Four Cubans Pardoned », 27 de agosto de 2004; Anita Snow, «Mireya Moscoso indulta a cuatro anticastristas», El Nuevo Herald, 27 de agosto de 2004; Glenn Kessler, « U.S. Denies Role in Cuban Exile’s Pardon », Washington Post, 27 August 2004: A18.
[28] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Posada Carriles: Prontuario de un terrorista made in USA», 19 April 2007.
[29] James LeMoyne, « Cuban Linked to Terror Bombings Is Freed by Government in Miami », The New York Times, 18 de July de 1990, Section A, p.1; The New York Times, « The Bosch Case Does Violence to Justice », 20 July 1990, Section A, p. 26.
[30] Salim Lamrani, Fidel Castro, Cuba et les Etats-Unis (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2006), p.
[31] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Mandatario venezolano exigió nuevamente extradición de Posada Carriles», 19 April 2007.
[32] Agencia Bolivariana de Noticias, «Daniel Ortega anunció que Nicaragua solicitará extradición de Posada Carriles», 19 April 2007.
[33] Deisy Francis Mexidor, «Condenan libertad del verdugo», Granma, 20 April 2007.
[34] Movimiento de No Alineados, «Movimiento No Alineados presenta protesta ante la ONU por liberación de Posada Carriles», Cubadebate, 20 April 2007.
[35] Salim Lamrani, Superpowers Principles (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 2005); Salim Lamrani, Washington contre Cuba (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2005); Salim Lamrani, La guerra contra el terrorismo y el caso de los Cinco (Barcelona: El Viejo Topo, 2005), Salim Lamrani, Terrorismo de Estados Unidos contra Cuba. El caso de los Cinco (La Habana: Editorial José Martí, 20050; Salim Lamrani, Il terrorismo degli Stati Uniti contro Cuba (Milan: Sperling & Kupfer, 2006).
[36] Ibid.
[37] Wilfredo Cancio Isla, «Posada Carriles podría quedar en libertad condicional», El Nuevo Herald, 17 April 2007; Associated Press, « Cuban Militant Posada Posts $250K Beil », 18 April 2007; Ian James, « Lawyer: U.S. Protecting Cuban Militant », Associated Press, 9 April 2007; Associated Press, « Judge Rejects Bid to Delay Bond Order For Anti-Castro Militant », 10 April 2007; Fabiola Sanchez, « Venezuelan military Agents Raid Home of Friend of Anti-Castro Militant Posada », Associated Press, 13 April 2007; Tim Weiner, « Cuban Exile Is Charged With Illegal Entry », The New York Times, 20 May 2005, Section A, p. 14; Reuters, « Castro Accuses Bush of Protecting Accused Bomber », 10 April 2007; Spencer S. Hsu & Nick Miroff, « U.S. Holds Suspects in War Crimes », The Washington Post, 4 April 2007; Jeff Franks, «Anti-Castro Exile Freedom En Route to Miami», Reuters, 19 April 2007; Los Angeles Times, « U.S. Loses Bid to Keep Posada Jailed », 18 April 2007; USA Today, « Cuba, Venezuela Protest pending release of Anti-communist », 11 April 2007; The Boston Globe, « Caracas Demands US Return of Militant », 21 May 2005; Eric Leser, « L’arrestation de l’anticastriste Luis Posada Carriles, à Miami, embarrasse les Etats-Unis », Le Monde, 6 April 2007; Jean-Hébert Armengaud, « Cuba réclame une figure anticastriste arrêtée aux Etats-Unis », Libération, 19 May 2005.
Salim Lamrani is French professor, writer and journalist specializing in relations between Cuba and U.S. He is the author of the following books: Washington contre Cuba (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2005), Cuba face à l’Empire (Genève: Timeli, 2006) and Fidel Castro, Cuba et les Etats-Unis (Pantin: Le Temps des Cerises, 2006).
US Prosecutorial Malfeasance in the Case of the Cuban Five
On the «Round Table» Cuban television program, the issue of the manipulation of justice in the case of five anti-terrorist fighters was analyzed
by Dora Perez Saez
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from Juventud Rebelde
«The most important thing that was placed at the center of the attention is what is called «malfeasance» under US law. That has been the constant theme running through the long legal process against the Cuban Five, » said Ricardo Alarcon de Quesada, president of the Cuban National Assembly.
During an interview broadcast on the «Round Table» news/commentary television program on Monday, details were given concerning oral presentations given before a panel of three judges of the US Court of Appeals in Atlanta on the previous Monday, August 20.
On the television program it was discussed how the panel of judges asked both teams —the prosecution and the defense— about unresolved issues. This hearing was part of an appeals process that began in December 2001, given that the law does not set a limit on the time that the judges must make a decision.
Alarcon denounced the malfeasance of the prosecution since the dawn of September 12, 1998, the day that the Cuban Five were arrested.
«They did it one Saturday,» he explained, «so that during that weekend they could not get a lawyer to represent them. That same weekend FBI investigators met with Congressional members of the Miami mafia. Therefore, by Monday, when the Cuban fighters were presented before a judge, they had already been convicted by the press.
«Likewise,» Alarcon added, «on August 20, the judge leading the panel of the Court of Appeals of Atlanta, had to request the district attorney gave him the classified documentation that that the full court had not been provided.»
The member of Cuba’s Political Bureau also commented that during the months in which the world was watching what would happen in the case of the boy Elian Gonzalez, it was not widely known that at the same time there were five detained Cubans in Miami, and that there lawyers requested the venue of the trial be in another city.
«In my opinion,» said Alarcon, «the process against the Five was as a consolation prize that the US government gave to the Miami mafia after it suffered such a terrible blow in the handling of the case of Elian (Gonzalez).»
«The fact of having waited several months to accuse Gerardo (one of the Cuban Five defendants) of conspiracy to commit murder is more proof of the malfeasance of the prosecution. The scandal was such that the Pentagon and the Department of Justice had to make statements acknowledging that nothing done by the men had put the security of the country at risk.
«But to prove positions like these, they needed a terrified and prejudiced jury to get them to concur. And that was what happened in Miami in the case of the Five,» Alarcon concluded.
Correct proceedings by Cuban anti-terrorists’ defense team
Aug. 28, 2007
Reprinted from Granma International
HAVANA, August 28 (PL).—The handling of the case of the five Cuban anti-terrorists continues to receive recognition by members of the international legal community after the hearing in the Court of Appeals in Atlanta.
On August 20, the lawyers for Fernando González, Antonio Guerrero, René González, Ramón Labañino and Gerardo Hernández refuted aspects of the trial from which they were handed down prison terms ranging from life times 3 to 15 years.
The Five, as they are known internationally, were detained on September 12, 1988 and subjected to a political trial in Miami, which concluded in 2001 with them receiving excessive and arbitrary sentences for alerting their country to acts of terrorism organized in Florida.
Richard Klugh, Fernando González’ lawyer, highlighted the interest shown by the Appeals Court judges, which gives them reason to feel optimistic over the future of the case, despite the long period of incarceration.
A similar view was expressed by Antonio Guerrero’s defense, Leonard Weinglass, who detailed the force and validity of the arguments put to the court.
The defense team concentrated on three issues: the charge of conspiracy to commit murder against Gerardo, that of committing espionage against Gerardo, Antonio and Ramón, which were discounted, and also the inappropriate conduct of the judge, which was highly evident.
In the presence of 73 eminent figures from the legal world, the lawyers once again demonstrated the political intent of the U.S. government, represented by the District Attorney’s Office, by sentencing the patriots without sufficient evidence.
In that context, Ricardo Alarcón, president of the Cuban Parliament, affirmed that any of the DA’s arbitrary decisions in the case of the five anti-terrorists would be enough to annul the trial and the sentences
Among the jurists supporting the case, Paolo Lins, president of the International Lawyers Union of Toronto, Canada, said that the labor of the defense was impressive, while Fabio Marcelli, general secretary of the Lawyers Union of Rome, described it as correct.
Norman Paech, a member of the German Parliament; Paul Bekaert of the Belgian Human Rights League; and Chilean attorney Juan Guzmán, were likewise in agreement with the legal reasons the defense presented against the arbitrary proceedings of the prosecution.
See also:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=CCdGdpeNps8 Video “Mission against Terror” http://www.antiterroristas.cu http://www.freethefive.org http://www.familiesforjustice.cu/interface.en/design/home.tpl.html http://www.fabiodicelmo.cu/home.asp http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/ http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/index.htm http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=7055 http://www.cubainformacion.tv http://www.cubanradio.cu http://www.cubacoop.com/cubacoop%20ingles/inicio.html http://www.cuba-humanidad.org http://www.saludthefilm.net/ns/index.html
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Inside Track: Take Cuba Off The Terrorist List
30.08.2007 11:34
by Wayne S. Smith (*)
08.06.2007
Cuba was placed on the list of terrorist nations in March of 1982 with little in the way of explanation. Twenty-five years later, the State Department’s reasons for keeping it there are totally unconvincing. It is not involved in any terrorist activities that the State Department can point to. It does not endorse terrorism, as the State Department says it does. On the contrary, it has condemned it in all its manifestations, has signed all twelve UN anti-terrorist resolutions and offered to sign agreements with the United States to cooperate in combating terrorism—an offer the Bush Administration ignores.
There are American fugitives in Cuba, yes, but even under our own legislation, this does not constitute grounds for declaring Cuba to be a terrorist state. And if Cuba does not regularly extradite those fleeing from American justice, the United States has not in more than 47 years extradited a single Cuban—including infamous terrorists such as Orlando Bosch and Luis Posada Carriles.
In sum, there is simply no credible evidence that Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism. The central question we should be asking is how can U.S. interests possibly be served by putting forward these spurious allegations and insisting that it is a terrorist state when it obviously is not, and by rebuffing its offers to cooperate in the struggle against terrorism? Does this not undermine our own credibility and cast doubt on our seriousness of purpose? Surely it is time to put an end to this dishonest and counterproductive policy. Congress should take the first step by holding hearings to examine the rationale and evidence—if any exists—behind this policy and to call for a new, more constructive approach.
Alleged Reasons for Placing Cuba on the List in the First Place
A Congressional Research Service (CRS) memorandum dated November 7, 2003, a copy of which Center for International Policy (CIP) has obtained, indicates that no explanation was given for Cuba’s inclusion on the list in 1982. According to the CRS memo, however, a State Department paper from a month before Cuba was placed on the list asserted that Cuba was encouraging terrorism and was especially active in El Salvador and Guatemala. Clearly, this must have been part of the rationale for placing it on the list. And yet, if Cuba’s support for guerrillas trying to overthrow an established government in El Salvador—or Guatemala—was enough to label it "a terrorist state", then the United States would have qualified as a terrorist state also, given that it was in the midst of supporting the Contras in their efforts to overthrow the Nicaraguan government.
Further, as I reported in my book, The Closest of Enemies, on April 19, a month after Cuba was placed on the list, the Reagan administration re-imposed restrictions on travel to the island (in the form of currency controls) and imposed various other sanctions against Cuba. The reasons it gave for these actions were 1) because "Cuba . . . is increasing its support for violence in the hemisphere" and 2) because Cuba refused to negotiate our foreign policy disagreements.
But as I pointed out in the book, in December of 1981, I had been informed by a high-ranking Cuban official that Cuba had suspended all arms shipments to Central America and that it hoped this major concession on its part would improve the atmosphere for negotiations, not only in Central America but between our two countries. This was almost certainly meant to be a response to a statement by Secretary of State Al Haig, who in a conversation with Cuban Vice President Carlos Rafael Rodriguez in Mexico the month before, had stated, in response to the Cuban’s indications of an interest in dialogue, that the United States wanted not words but changes in Cuban policies. Here was a major change.
I reported this December conversation to the Department of State, asking if we had any hard evidence to the contrary—for example, that Cuba was continuing to ship arms to Central America. If not, I recommended that the United States begin a dialogue.
I had to follow up with a number of cables, insisting on an answer. I finally got one in March, acknowledging that the United States did not have hard evidence of continuing Cuban arms shipments to Central America, but that it did not matter. In other words, the United States was not interested in dialogue. Where, then, was the evidence of "increasing support for violence"?
Cuba that was seeking negotiations—or dialogue—and the United States was rebuffing those overtures, not the other way around, as the State Department suggested. This outright misrepresentation of the facts to the American people was one of the factors which caused me to leave the Foreign Service shortly thereafter (*).
Bogus Reasons for Keeping Cuba on the List
After 25 years, Cuba remains on the State Department’s annual list of state sponsors of terrorism for reasons that do not withstand the most perfunctory examination. There is, for example, the oft-repeated charge that Cuba endorses terrorism as a tactic. Former Undersecretary of State John Bolton, for one, claimed in March of 2004 that Fidel Castro "continues to view terror as a legitimate tactic to further revolutionary objectives."
The charge is simply not true, and neither Bolton nor anyone else has been able to point to a single statement of Castro’s endorsing terrorism. On the contrary, there are myriad Cuban statements condemning it. Within hours of the 9/11 attack, for example, the Cuban government issued a statement condemning the attacks and ruing the loss of life. Late in September, Castro categorically condemned all forms of terrorism as an "ethically indefensible phenomenon which must be eradicated." He vowed that, "the territory of Cuba will never be used for terrorist actions against the American people."
Bogus Charges That Cuba is a Biological Warfare Threat
Back in 2004, Bolton said that the Bush administration was "concerned that Cuba is developing a limited biological weapons effort . . . and believes Cuba remains a terrorist and biological warfare threat to the United States."
Bolton’s charges caused a stir. Over the past three years, however, they have widely come to be seen as politically motivated and groundless. Certainly neither he nor anyone else has been able to put forward any evidence to support the charges. The Department of State no longer even makes them.
Further, the Center for Defense Information (CDI) sent several delegations to Cuba to investigate and in one case was accompanied by CIP. They were allowed to go anywhere they wished and see anything requested. Their conclusions were perhaps best summed up by retired General Charles Wilhelm, the former commander of SOUTHCOM, who accompanied one of the delegations. "While Cuba certainly has the capability to develop and produce chemical and biological weapons, nothing we saw or heard led us to the conclusion that they were proceeding on this path."
Wilhelm’s conclusions were practically echoed by a National Intelligence Estimate conducted in the summer of 2004 and reported in The New York Times on September 18, 2004. It said that "the Intelligence Community continues to believe that Cuba has the technical capability [emphasis added] to pursue some aspects of an offensive biological weapons program."
It made no claim, however, that Cuba was pursuing such a program.
In sum, unless accompanied by new evidence, any charges that Cuba poses a biological warfare threat to the United States must be seen as baseless.
Further, it should be noted that sending delegations to Cuba to investigate and discuss the matter with the Cubans showed that scientific exchanges, on a regular and ongoing basis, are clearly the best way to create transparency and build confidence in one another’s positions. We need more such exchanges, not fewer, and yet the Bush Administration has taken counterproductive steps to impede them.
The Case of the Annual Reports
One may have a twinge of sympathy for the analysts who craft the list of state sponsors of terrorism. Their instructions are to write and publish a report every year saying that Cuba is such a sponsor. But what about evidence?
In years past, the analysts seemed to handle that dilemma by using unverified and highly questionable reports. As monitoring efforts have increased over the past few years and the specious conclusions pointed out, the analysts seem to have turned to a new tactic—non-sequitors that do not prove that Cuba sponsors terrorism. This year’s report, for example, complained that "Cuba did not attempt to track, block, or seize terrorist assets, although the authority to do so is contained in Cuba’s Law 93 against acts of terrorism, as well as Instruction 19 of the Superintendent of the Cuban Central Bank."
But any decent lawyer would respond to that by asking "what assets?" There is no evidence at all that Al-Qaeda or any other terrorist organization has any assets in Cuba. And so, there is nothing to seize. The only thing the statement makes clear is that Cuba does have laws on the books against acts of terrorism. How, one might ask, does that square with the report’s assertion that it is a terrorist state?
And as it does every year, last year’s report mentions the presence in Cuba of members of the Basque ETA guerrilla organization, and the Colombian FARC and ELN. In past years, the State Department tried to suggest that they were in Cuba against the wishes of their respective governments and had sinister objectives. But that suggestion was shot down year after year by representatives of the Spanish and Colombian governments. This year, no such allegations are made. It is acknowledged that they are living in Cuba legally. Further, the report states that: "There is no information concerning terrorist activities of these or other organizations on Cuban territory. . . . The United States is not aware of specific terrorist enclaves in the country."
If they are there legally and are not involved in terrorist activities, then how does their presence in any way lead to the conclusion that Cuba sponsors terrorism?
This year’s report repeats its annual complaint that Cuba permits American fugitives to live in Cuba and is not responsive to U.S. extradition requests.
True, there are American fugitives in Cuba. Most are hijackers who came in the 1970s and have lived in Cuba since then. There are a few others, probably seven or eight, wanted for crimes committed in the United States. It is also true that Cuba has not responded positively to U.S. extradition requests. But two things must be noted about that. First, for all practical purposes, the 1904 extradition treaty is simply no longer operative, principally because the United States has not honored a single Cuba request for extradition since 1959. Second, most of the "crimes" committed in the U.S. were of a political nature, and Article VI of the treaty excludes the extradition of those whose crimes were of a "political character."
Furthermore, as Robert Muse, an international lawyer, noted in a 2004 report, none of the U.S. fugitives in Cuba provides a basis for declaring Cuba to be a "state sponsor of terrorism." Legal authority to make such a designation is found in Section 6(j) of the 1979 Export Administration Act, which says that it must be demonstrated that the fugitives have committed "terrorist" acts and that those acts were "international" in character. Muse states that he has been unable to identify a single U.S. fugitive in Cuba who meets those twofold criteria. Thus, they are extraneous to the definition of Cuba as a "state sponsor of terrorism."
In sum, as CIP has noted in its responses over the past few years, the annual reports present not a shred of evidence to confirm that Cuba is in fact a terrorist state.
A Policy that Undercuts Our Efforts Against Terrorism
And it is not only that we have no evidence that Cuba is a terrorist state. Our Cuba policy actually obstructs our own efforts against terrorism. As President Bush has said over and over again, anyone who shelters terrorists is a terrorist. But the fact is that we are sheltering a whole series of outright terrorists in Miami. The most recent arrival is the notorious Luis Posada Carriles, accused of being one of the masterminds of the bombing of a Cubana airliner in 1976 that killed 73 innocent people, including the Cuban junior fencing team. He was in a Venezuelan prison awaiting trial on that charge when he escaped in 1985. He went to Central America, where for a time he worked for Oliver North in the Contra operation against Nicaragua.
Subsequently, in a 1998 interview with The New York Times, he bragged of ordering the bombing of a number of tourist hotels in Havana, which led to the death of an Italian tourist and the wounding of several other people.
And then in 2000, he was arrested in Panama and later convicted of "endangering public safety" because of his involvement in a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro by blowing up a public auditorium where Castro was to speak before an audience of some 1,500. In 2004, Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) and her two congressional colleagues, Lincoln (R-FL) and Mario Diaz Balart (R-FL), appealed to then-President Mireya Moscoso (**) to pardon him, along with three others involved in the plot: Guillermo Novo, convicted of the 1976 murder in Washington of Chilean diplomat Orlando Letelier (though his conviction was later overturned); Gaspar Jimenez, who spent six years in prison in Mexico for trying to kidnap a Cuban diplomat and killing his bodyguard in the process; and Pedro Remon, who had pleaded guilty in 1986 of trying to blow up the Cuban Mission to the United Nations.
In August of 2004, in one of her last acts as President of Panama, Moscoso pardoned them all. Jimenez, Remon and Novo, who were all American citizens, immediately flew back to Miami and received a hero’s welcome. Posada, who has Venezuelan citizenship, decided to bide his time in Honduras for a few months, but then, as we shall see below, quietly entered the U.S. in March.
Nor was this the first time Ros-Lehtinen had acted to free terrorists. Orlando Bosch, another mastermind of the 1976 bombing of the Cubana airliner, was released from Venezuelan prison under mysterious circumstances in 1987 and returned to Miami without a visa in 1988. The Immigration and Naturalization Service began proceedings to deport him, and as the associate attorney general argued at the time: "The security of this nation is affected by its ability to urge credibly other nations to refuse aid and shelter to terrorists. We could not shelter Dr. Bosch and maintain that credibility."
But shelter him we did. Urged on by Ros-Lehtinen and Jeb Bush—then managing her election campaign—George H.W. Bush pardoned Bosch, who has lived freely ever since in Miami.
Posada returned to Miami in March. Everyone knew he was there, but the federal government made no effort to apprehend him, or even to acknowledge his presence, until May, when he gave a press conference and forced their hand.
He was then arrested, but rather than charging him with acts of terrorism, he was simply charged with illegal entry and sent off to El Paso for an administrative immigration hearing, a complete farce. He was ordered deported, but, as the U.S. authorities already knew, there were no countries willing to take him except Venezuela, which had already requested his extradition for the 1976 bombing of the Cubana airliner. The federal judge, on nothing more than the opinion of a long-time associate of Posada’s, ruled that he could not be extradited to Venezuela for fear that he would be tortured there. Never mind that the Venezuelan government had given assurances that he would be held under the most transparent circumstances.
To hold him longer, but to avoid any charge of terrorism, the government then came up with a charge of giving false statements on his application of entry. Another sham, which finally ended on May 8, 2007, when Judge Kathleen Cardone, seeing clearly that skullduggery was afoot, charged the government with bad faith and "engaging in fraud, deceit and trickery." (That’s the Bush administration she’s talking about!)
That being the case, she said, "this court is left with no choice but to dismiss the indictment."
Posada was then freed and returned to Miami.
Some three months have now passed and the Bush Administration has given no indication that it intends to take any further action against Posada. What it should do is clear. Venezuela has asked for his extradition. We have an extradition treaty with Venezuela. Under that treaty, and others, we must either extradite him to Venezuela or we must indict him for acts of terrorism and try him in the United States. If we do not, we will be in blatant violation of international treaties and will be seen as openly sheltering another terrorist. Unfortunately, at the moment it seems that is exactly what the Bush Administration intends to do. If so, it will seriously undermine the credibility of our own stance against terrorism—taking us back to the idea that "one man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter!" That is no way to win the war against terrorism.
(*) The author was a U.S. diplomat and specialist in Cuban affairs for roughly 25 years, leaving the Foreign Service in 1982, when he was Chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, because of his disagreements over Cuba policy. He has been an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University since 1984 and a Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy in Washington, DC since 1992.
Meanwhile...
(**) Mireya Moscoso involved in drug scandal…
PANAMA, August 14 (PL).—The revelation by Colombian former soccer player Freddy Rincón that ex-President Mireya Moscoso suggested that he invest funds in a business to launder money from drug trafficking hit the headlines in the Panamanian press today.
In spite of a refutation by her lawyers, the La Prensa, Panamá-América, La Estrella de Panamá and Critica dailies, with the largest circulation in the country, have reported Rincón’s charge, covered in Colombia by RCN and El País.
Rincón is in prison in Brazil, awaiting the result of an extradition application by Panama for his alleged links with money-laundering via a company called Nautipesca, owned by Pablo Rayo Montaño, a Colombian drug trafficker.
According to the RCN investigation, Rincón informed the Brazilian justice system that Rayo Montaño had advised him to invest in Panama, a proposition subsequently put to him by Mireya Moscoso, who was president of Panama at the time.
The Panamá-América daily reports that: “Priscilla Reyes, Rincón’s wife, confirmed a telephone conversation between the former soccer player and Moscoso and a meeting both had in a Panamanian restaurant.”
Reyes said that Rayo Montaño was a business executive, part of the (Moscoso) government and even had a Panamanian identity card.
The ex-president stated in a press release that this was the second time that rash information without any substance had been published trying to establish some kind of link between her and the former soccer player, Colombian Freddy Rincón.
Translated by Granma International
F Espinoza
seems a perfectly good law to me
30.08.2007 15:36
Whats your problem?
Has a country the right to defend itself from further attacks, whether you agree with its politics or not?
Who funds reporters without frontiers?
which countries have killed the most independant journalists these last few years?
Which country has has been involved in foreign invasions which have resulted in 8 million deaths this last 60 years?
Hatestater , take off your blinkers and get some medication for your paranoia.
daggle
What a justification! Be-daggled
30.08.2007 16:02
Comprende Daggle?
state hater
Ken
30.08.2007 17:21
Donations by private foundations (the Soros Fondation, the Center for a Free Cuba, the National Endowment for Democracy and the Fondation de France) decreased slightly as a result of some projects (such as the Handbook for Bloggers and reproduction of the paper De Cuba)
--------------------------------
Check out the Donors, here is one for starters.....
Center for a Free Cuba..
BOARD OF DIRECTORS: Mr. Manuel J. Cutillas, Mr. Filiberto Agusti, Esq., Ambassador Everett Briggs, Mr. Nestor Carbonell, Ms. Beatriz Casals, Mrs. Anita Winsor Edwards, Mr. Jeronimo Esteve-Abril, Mr. Nicolas Estrella, Mr. Richard J. Fernandez, Mr. Guillermo Marmol, Mr. Raul Masvidal, Mr. Richard O’Connell, Dr. Susan Kaufman Purcell, Ambassador Jose Sorzano.
RESEARCH COUNCIL: Luis E. Aguilar (Georgetown University) * Sergio Diaz-Briquets (Casals and Associates) * Georges Fauriol (Center for Strategic and International Studies) * Mark Falcoff (American Enterprise Institute) * Edward González (RAND) * Irving Louis Horowitz (Rutgers University) * Enrico Mario Santí (University of Kentucky, Lexington) * Eusebio Mujal-León (Georgetown University) * Jaime Suchlicki (University of Miami
-----------------------------------
If you start checking out the names it becomes interesting ie..Cutillas ex CEO of Bacardi.....Ambassador Everett Briggs appointed to the NSC by Bush the 1st... Recently accused in Panama of spying
Ken
Big "trolls" and little "trolls"... jajaja
30.08.2007 23:38
Don't drink Bacardí; Havana Club is better, genuine and safer, hic!
This kind of “service” equals in hypocrisy the attempts of our little domestic trolls, but of course are much more harmful. The lies about revolutionary processes are intended to counterinform and manipulate the minds of honest persons and what’s said about Cuba’s truth is a good example of this.
On the other hand, is precisely for the purpose of knowing the peoples reality that media’s like Indy are so important: to break the silence where it’s intended to reign and to destroy hypocrisy and unveil conscience.
Some day we’ll also have Indy in Cuba. Venezuela and Cuba are constructing a submarine fiber optics cable that will serve, among other purpose, to increase the presence of Cuba in the web.
Meanwhile, the cuban people express in their webs; blogs; the intranet that relies numerous sites all over the island; the 602 “Joven Club” (Community Computer Club’s), many of them open 24 hours, seven days a week…
Ken: there is a video (“Bacardí, the vampire’s secret”) about Bacardí activity related with Cuba in:
There is also a article (in french) about RSF in:
where Robert Ménard from this “NGO” apologize about torture!
About Internet in Cuba…
"Ten lies in Spain’s La Vanguardia"
By Rosa Miriam Elizalde
On June 13, 2007, the Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia published an article titled "The Internet and Chávez, according to Antonio Pasquali" that should be studied in communications schools as a model for the fabrication of news by an expert through the use of half-truths, lies and speculations.
Let us give Antonio Pasquali, the author of "Understanding Communications," the benefit of the doubt. Let us assume that he did not have time to incorporate part of the information hinted at in that article (or that the newspaper had no space for it) and therefore the message is not only false but also contradictory and unsustainable in places.
In any case, there is no way to exempt from slander the basic gist of this article, as stated in the opening paragraph: "After the nationalization of the CANTV telephone company by President Hugo Chávez, a process of 'Cubanization' of telecommunications has intensified in Venezuela that undoubtedly will increase the control over conversations, data transmission and eavesdropping capability."
Let us look at some of the assertions:
1. It is a source of concern that an underwater fiber-optics cable, 1,552 kilometers long, is being laid between La Guaira (Venezuela) and Siboney (Cuba).
What's so strange about that? Why did Pasquali (or the reporter who quoted him) forget that in Cuba all Internet connections are via satellite -- a much slower and costly method than optic fiber -- because of the laws of the U.S. blockade against the island?
Cuba does not blockade itself or any other country. The successive U.S. administrations have prevented Cuba from connecting to the worldwide web of underwater fiber-optics that has eight points in the Caribbean (very close to Cuba) and would extraordinarily optimize communications.
The ARCOS system (Americas Region Caribbean Optical-ring System) connects the U.S., Mexico, Central America, South America and the Caribbean with optic fiber and provides high-speed broad-band service. But ARCOS is co-owned by 28 regional carriers and is headed by the New World Network, whose largest shareholder -- the United States -- owns 88.2 percent of the stock.
2. Venezuela would supply to Cuba a monstrous capacity of 160 gigabytes per second that has no application in an island that's technologically backward.
Through a mutually beneficial accord, Venezuela would supply to Cuba the legitimate right to enjoy and link to the Worldwide Web. Official U.S. documents explain why Cuba belatedly entered the Internet, with a weak infrastructure that is further burdened by its high cost, because the U.S. blockade forbids the sale of U.S. technology to the island. And, as we know, the U.S. dominates the hardware and software industries.
3. Cuba has only 124 megabytes per second in satellite download and 65 mb/s in uplink. That's a ridiculous figure.
That's right; it is a ridiculous figure. But Pasquali did not say that the rate is imposed by the United States, which decides how broad a band Cuba can lease. Any hotel or Internet cafe not on the Cuban archipelago has a bandwidth equal to, or broader than, the entire bandwidth at Cuba's disposal for Internet transmissions.
Why does Pasquali overlook this information? Why does he avoids saying that each megabyte costs Cuba four times more than to anyone else in the world, and that Cuba must struggle hard to get it?
The island obtained international navigation in 1996, under a political condition: it is part of the Torricelli Law package (1992) "to democratize Cuban society." This law also decrees that each megabyte (rate of connection speed) leased from U.S. companies or their subsidiaries must be approved by the U.S. Treasury Department. That decree is in effect today.
Washington limited the contract and imposed extraordinary sanctions -- fines of $50,000 for each violation -- to those who, in the U.S. or outside, favor doing electronic business or bringing Cuba the slightest economic benefit through the Web.
4. The new Venezuelan cable will multiply by more than 2,500 times Cuba's communications capacity. This investment is a mystery; Cuba's telephone density is one of the world's lowest.
That's excellent news for Cubans and, at the same time, a contradiction in the information supplied by Pasquali. On one hand, Pasquali says it's ridiculous for Cuba to have such a narrow bandwidth (he implies it's a government decision) and on the other he worries that the Cubans might want to multiply their connection capability and increase their telephone density.
Such a formulation would make no sense if Pasquali's intention were not to slip in a prejudice: "The satanic island will gain the technology in order to spy on everyone." The writer would have us believe, without providing any evidence, that the victim is actually the criminal -- an absurdity usually found in noir novels.
5. The number of Cuba's connections to the Internet is the smallest in Latin America (0.9 per 100 inhabitants). What's the hidden reason to expand Cuba's computer capacity if the population have no access to the Internet?
More of the same drivel to prepare the ground for another manipulative argument. Cuba has had to build a social and intensive access project, so that more than 90 percent of the computers are used by more than one individual.
It's pure common sense. If you have to distribute a hotel's connection capability to 12 million people, you can do only two things: either give it to a small group of people or find an alternative that guarantees the widest and most rational utilization of that resource.
Cuba has done just that. It has given priority to the universities, cultural and health centers, the news media and the Youth Computer Clubs, more than 600 centers that operate everywhere in the country, 24 hours a day, and offer courses to people of all ages so they can learn to use the technology.
One million people have graduated from these courses. All schools have computer labs, with an average of 20 students per computer. In Cuba's remote mountain towns there are 146 classrooms attended by just one child who is taught by a teacher and several instructors, one of them a computer instructor.
Why would a blockaded and poor country invest millions of dollars in teaching its people, beginning with the very young, electronic communications? If the government is interested in limiting and censoring Internet access, why does it teach (using the most modern computers available) more than 2 million children and teenagers, including those who live in remote mountain areas? Why is this fact -- which is easily verifiable -- silenced?
6. Cuba is one of the 13 countries that most censor the Internet.
Where is the proof? So far, the only basis for that assertion is its constant repetition, without any real support. The most ferocious proponents of this campaign, merrily quoted in all U.S. State Department reports, tried to prove it and used illegal methods for the purpose.
[The French organization] Reporters Without Borders in October 2006 sent a French reporter to the island. She spent one month there and later submitted the results of her espionage mission, under the pseudonym Claire Voeux.
The Miami Herald interviewed her and reported the results of her research, which, according to her, "were surprising." The Internet cafes in hotels and post offices permitted free access to Web sites, included those that were considered "subversive," Voeux said. "I was surprised to visit all the Web sites," she told the newspaper. "It is a question of access control, not of censorship." Indeed, that's the report, but mysteriously no one has paid attention.
7. The ordinary Cuban cannot use the Internet.
False. No one can use such a narrow channel of navigation, not even for all the money in the world. If the country turned over to a few the narrow band of satellite linkups, navigation in the Web would be impossible for the hundreds of thousands of Cubans who now sail it.
The fiber-optic cable that will connect Cuba and Venezuela is a great hope to us. It will not only improve the quality of navigation but also will enable us to extend this service to every Cuban home, a dream that is a lot older than one might suppose.
The Central Institute for Digital Research (ICID, for the Spanish name) was created in Cuba in 1969. If you look at President Fidel Castro's speeches for that period, you'll run into these words: "We are a country without natural resources, but we have a very important resource: the intelligence of the Cuban people. Computers are a part of that, and I am convinced that each Cuban will in the future have machines like these." What other objective could a country that's teaching computer use to millions of people have?
8. Tourists can download their e-mail in hotels only if they're willing to pay very high fees.
I have yet to see an uprising over Internet access fees in tourist destinations in Europe, where such fees are unbelievably more expensive than in Cuban hotels and where Europeans don't suffer our situation.
And here's another hidden fact: the fees paid in Cuba by tourists cover only a small part of the cost of Internet access. Every year, the Cuban government pays 10 times more for that 124 mb/s conduit than one of the Hilton hotels in Miami for the same service. And the Hilton hotels have the advantage that they don't deal with delayed satellite transmission and don't have to pay for overseas communications.
9. "For what purpose? I fear the worst. With one tenth the capability of that cable [from La Guaira to Siboney] they could reroute to Havana all telephone conversations made in Venezuela, on fixed lines and cell phones, to filter and tap them."
Another absurd speculation. This highly sophisticated data-mining technology is almost the exclusive property of the United States. There is enough documentation to prove that the U.S. is the only country with the ability to process 9 trillion e-mails, 1 billion cell-phone calls and 1 billion fixed-line calls every year, passing through the nodes that control 90 percent of Internet transmissions.
The New York Times has explained that the U.S. can do it "because the National Security Agency has enormous influence over telecommunication companies, which are obliged to cooperate on intelligence matters. Through back doors carefully established by presidential orders in the name of the war on terrorism, U.S. intelligence officials gain access to the major nodes through which the world's communications pass." An expert like Pasquali must be perfectly aware of this.
10. Chávez granted a Cuban-Venezuelan joint venture a contract for $134 million to print the identity papers and passports of Venezuelans. According to Venezuelan Interior Minister Pedro Carreño, "very important information about each citizen will be stored away." This way, information about 26 million Venezuelans is turned over to a foreign government.
This is the same logic followed by George W. Bush, who, in his 2004 Plan for Cuba, arrived at the simplistic conclusion that, because Cuba is capable of producing biotechnological products for health care, it is also producing bacteriological weapons. He offers no proof, but -- so what?
Pasquali picks up the tune. If Cuba can produce software to prop up its infrastructure, ameliorate the blockade and derive revenue, it will surely control the use of that technology, which was developed for third parties. It's like saying that after you buy an empty bottle, someone tries to tell you that the liquid you pour into it is the property of the glass-blower who made it.
It's another absurdity, but it is not questioned because it helps to demonize and alienate Cuba and Venezuela. Why doesn't someone talk about the PDVSA precedent? People with a good memory will recall that the management of that Venezuelan oil company and all its products were controlled by a U.S. corporation linked to Washington's intelligence services, which violated Venezuela's sovereignty with impudence.
But, of course, that's something else altogether. To overcome his own prejudice, Antonio Pasquali would have to understand not abstract communication but the difficulties faced by people who don't have a voice. For that, there is no space in La Vanguardia or in the prosperous market of hatred toward our countries.
Rosa Miriam Elizalde is a renowned Cuban journalist.
F Espinoza
Why there is no Cuban Indymedia site
31.08.2007 14:03
free elections,
free speech,
a free press,
free trade unions,
free travel abroad for its citizens,
free association,
more than ONE leagl political party (the Communist party),
and a free and independent judiciary
then all that technical jargon about why Cuba doesn't have an Indymedia site might be believable. As it is, we can safely assume that there is no Cuban Indymedia site for the same reason that all these other freedoms are non-existent on Cuba. That reason is that Castro is the dictator of a toatalitarian regime, and that he hates freedom like all dictators do.
By yhe way Espinoza, there is no blockade of Cuba. The US has a trade emabrgo that severely restricts the right of US citizens to traade with Cuba. Everyone else in the world is free to trade with Cuba as much as they want to, but as Cubans are so poor, like the inhabitants of all communist countries tend to be, not that much trade goes on. Cuba gets a lot of aid, like all backward countries.
simon
state hater complained:
02.09.2007 12:40
"In Cuba, they don't just censor you now - they throw you in jail."
Yes - that'll be the 2003 article from here:
and "Cuba: back to darkness"
Which will be a corporate repost from the Miami Herald - Published Thursday, March 18, 1999, in the Miami Herald -
2003 was 4 years ago - 1999 even further back - they breach the guidelines - they're gone. You couldn't even be bothered to link to the sources.
Further posts complaining about moderation will be hidden. Got a problem with that - use the list. This is a newswire.
imcista
There are no elections in Cuba!
02.09.2007 19:24
Challenge to Cuban civics
By María Julia Mayoral—Granma daily
ALREADY a daily practice and, at the same time a growing aspiration among Cubans, equality of opportunity has another peak moment to express itself at national level: the nomination of candidates for the municipal assembly of People's Power, which begins this Saturday and continues to the end of September.
A minimum of 30,400 candidates can be nominated, given that each constituency (there are more than 15,200) has to complete the process with at least two candidates. In other words, there can never be just one candidate.
Without the intervention of a political party that would usurp the rights of the people, voters’ individual and collective responsibility is key at the point of proposing their state representatives.
Political affiliation, gender, occupation or religious belief have no part in candidates being nominated; moreover, any Cuban can nominate him/herself. Nominations depend on popular approval, given that each nomination assembly (more than 50,600) puts forward the candidate with the most votes.
However, the aim and need to improve the system in the country merits each elector – and particularly the great majority of the people who recognize themselves as defenders of the Revolution – making a serious evaluation of their potential candidates.
Without good candidates – people with sensibility, an enterprising spirit of solidarity, a vocation for serving others, fidelity to the people’s revolutionary interests, education, political courage and an ability to analyze problems and seek solutions with the participation of their fellow citizens – it would be impossible to have People's Power assemblies potentially efficient in terms of exercising their complex functions.
Once again, the decisions are in the hands of millions of Cubans as electors; this is a civic right and duty that merits being undertaken with political maturity and revolutionary passion.
Translated by Granma International
F Espinoza