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Mika Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 09:17 AM
Original message
Petition seeks pardon for jailed (Cuban) exile bomber
Source: Miami Herald

Petition seeks pardon for jailed exile bomber
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/miami-dade/story/621319.html
Several Cuban exile organizations have launched a campaign to persuade President Bush to pardon convicted Cuban exile militant Eduardo Arocena, reputed mastermind of Omega 7, whose group was blamed for numerous bombings in Miami and New York.

Arocena, now 65, was sentenced to life plus 35 years in prison for gunning down a Cuban diplomat and for several bombings in the New York City area. Also, a federal jury in Miami convicted Arocena of planting nine bombs over a four-year period in the Miami area.

After bombings, Omega 7 would leave notes taking responsibility. They were often signed by ''Omar,'' who was later identified as Arocena.

-

In September 1984, a jury found the 43-year-old former dockworker guilty of murder, attempted murder and of numerous bombings.


Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/miami-dade/story/621319.html




Not a murdering terrorist. He's a freedom fighter. :sarcasm:
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Mika Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 09:21 AM
Response to Original message
1. Follow up of some domestic terrorism committed by Cuban exiles


http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2000-04-20/news/mullin/full

1968 From MacArthur Causeway, pediatrician Orlando Bosch fires bazooka at a Polish freighter. (City of Miami later declares "Orlando Bosch Day." Federal agents will jail him in 1988.)

1972 Julio Iglesias, performing at a local nightclub, says he wouldn't mind "singing in front of Cubans." Audience erupts in anger. Singer requires police escort. Most radio stations drop Iglesias from playlists. One that doesn't, Radio Alegre, receives bomb threats.

1974 Exile leader José Elias de la Torriente murdered in his Coral Gables home after failing to carry out a planned invasion of Cuba.

1974 Bomb blast guts the office of Spanish-language magazine Replica.

1974 Several small Cuban businesses, citing threats, stop selling Replica.

1974 Three bombs explode near a Spanish-language radio station.

1974 Hector Diaz Limonta and Arturo Rodriguez Vives murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1975 Luciano Nieves murdered after advocating peaceful coexistence with Cuba.

1975 Another bomb damages Replica's office.

1976 Rolando Masferrer and Ramon Donestevez murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1976 Car bomb blows off legs of WQBA-AM news director Emilio Milian after he publicly condemns exile violence.

1977 Juan José Peruyero murdered in internecine exile power struggles.

1979 Cuban film Memories of Underdevelopment interrupted by gunfire and physical violence instigated by two exile groups.

1979 Bomb discovered at Padron Cigars, whose owner helped negotiate release of 3600 Cuban political prisoners.

1979 Bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1980 Another bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1980 Powerful anti-personnel bomb discovered at American Airways Charter, which arranges flights to Cuba.

1981 Bomb explodes at Mexican Consulate on Brickell Avenue in protest of relations with Cuba.

1981 Replica's office again damaged by a bomb.

1982 Two outlets of Hispania Interamericana, which ships medicine to Cuba, attacked by gunfire.

1982 Bomb explodes at Venezuelan Consulate in downtown Miami in protest of relations with Cuba.

1982 Bomb discovered at Nicaraguan Consulate.

1982 Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre defends $10,000 grant to exile commando group Alpha 66 by noting that the organization "has never been accused of terrorist activities inside the United States."

1983 Another bomb discovered at Replica.

1983 Another bomb explodes at Padron Cigars.

1983 Bomb explodes at Paradise International, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1983 Bomb explodes at Little Havana office of Continental National Bank, one of whose executives, Bernardo Benes, helped negotiate release of 3600 Cuban political prisoners.

1983 Miami City Commissioner Demetrio Perez seeks to honor exile terrorist Juan Felipe de la Cruz, accidentally killed while assembling a bomb. (Perez is now a member of the Miami-Dade County Public School Board and owner of the Lincoln-Martí private school where Elian Gonzalez is enrolled.)

1983 Gunfire shatters windows of three Little Havana businesses linked to Cuba.

1986 South Florida Peace Coalition members physically attacked in downtown Miami while demonstrating against Nicaraguan contra war.

1987 Bomb explodes at Cuba Envios, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes at Almacen El Español, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes at Cubanacan, which ships packages to Cuba.

1987 Car belonging to Bay of Pigs veteran is firebombed.

1987 Bomb explodes at Machi Viajes a Cuba, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1987 Bomb explodes outside Va Cuba, which ships packages to Cuba.

1988 Bomb explodes at Miami Cuba, which ships medical supplies to Cuba.

1988 Bomb threat against Iberia Airlines in protest of Spain's relations with Cuba.

1988 Bomb explodes outside Cuban Museum of Art and Culture after auction of paintings by Cuban artists.

1988 Bomb explodes outside home of Maria Cristina Herrera, organizer of a conference on U.S.-Cuba relations.

1988 Bomb threat against WQBA-AM after commentator denounces Herrera bombing.

1988 Bomb threat at local office of Immigration and Naturalization Service in protest of terrorist Orlando Bosch being jailed.

1988 Bomb explodes near home of Griselda Hidalgo, advocate of unrestricted travel to Cuba.

1988 Bomb damages Bele Cuba Express, which ships packages to Cuba.

1989 Another bomb discovered at Almacen El Español, which ships packages to Cuba.

1989 Two bombs explode at Marazul Charters, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1990 Another, more powerful, bomb explodes outside the Cuban Museum of Art and Culture.

1991 Using crowbars and hammers, exile crowd rips out and urinates on Calle Ocho "Walk of Fame" star of Mexican actress Veronica Castro, who had visited Cuba.

1992 Union Radio employee beaten and station vandalized by exiles looking for Francisco Aruca, who advocates an end to U.S. embargo.

1992 Cuban American National Foundation mounts campaign against the Miami Herald, whose executives then receive death threats and whose newsracks are defaced and smeared with feces.

1992 Americas Watch releases report stating that hard-line Miami exiles have created an environment in which "moderation can be a dangerous position."

1993 Inflamed by Radio Mambí commentator Armando Perez-Roura, Cuban exiles physically assault demonstrators lawfully protesting against U.S. embargo. Two police officers injured, sixteen arrests made. Miami City Commissioner Miriam Alonso then seeks to silence anti-embargo demonstrators: "We have to look at the legalities of whether the City of Miami can prevent them from expressing themselves."

1994 Human Rights Watch/Americas Group issues report stating that Miami exiles do not tolerate dissident opinions, that Spanish-language radio promotes aggression, and that local government leaders refuse to denounce acts of intimidation.

1994 Two firebombs explode at Replica magazine's office.

1994 Bomb threat to law office of Magda Montiel Davis following her videotaped exchange with Fidel Castro.

1996 Music promoter receives threatening calls, cancels local appearance of Cuba's La Orquesta Aragon.

1996 Patrons attending concert by Cuban jazz pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba physically assaulted by 200 exile protesters. Transportation for exiles arranged by Dade County Commissioner Javier Souto.

1996 Firebomb explodes at Little Havana's Centro Vasco restaurant preceding concert by Cuban singer Rosita Fornes.

1996 Firebomb explodes at Marazul Charters, which arranges travel to Cuba.

1996 Arson committed at Tu Familia Shipping, which ships packages to Cuba.

1997 Bomb threats, death threats received by radio station WRTO-FM following its short-lived decision to include in its playlist songs by Cuban musicians.

1998 Bomb threat empties concert hall at MIDEM music conference during performance by 91-year-old Cuban musician Compay Segundo.

1998 Bomb threat received by Amnesia nightclub in Miami Beach preceding performance by Cuban musician Orlando "Maraca" Valle.

1998 Firebomb explodes at Amnesia nightclub preceding performance by Cuban singer Manolín.

1999 Violent protest at Miami Arena performance of Cuban band Los Van Van leaves one person injured, eleven arrested.

1999 Bomb threat received by Seville Hotel in Miami Beach preceding performance by Cuban singer Rosita Fornes. Hotel cancels concert.



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peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 09:40 AM
Response to Original message
2. He's a terrorist. The red light went on years ago. Cuban-Americans - Please get real.
Your plea is an insult to all our kids who are dead and injured in serious ways, including the mind. And you want to free a terrorist. Please please don't insult us. Then, send Luis Posada Carilles back to jail.

You are going too far.
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Judi Lynn Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 10:45 AM
Response to Original message
3. Absolutely, he's a deadly terrorist. People in this country have known this beyond doubt since his
testimony in the New York trial when he gunned down the U. N. diplomat in public, and admitted having hand carried biological weapons into Cuba:
Last year Josh Bolton, US Under Secretary of State, gave a speech before the rabid rightwing Heritage Foundation entitled "Beyond the Axis of Evil." In the speech, Bolton designated Cuba, Libya and Syria as "rogue states," in other words states facing possible military action. Bolton went so far as to say "Cuba's threat to our security has often been underplayed," stopping an inch short of claiming Castro plans to attack Florida with biological weapons.

It was the other way around, though.

Back in 1961 and 1962, the CIA used biological weapons on Cuba's agricultural workers. A decade later, the CIA introduced swine fever into the island, precipitating an epidemic which culminated in the death of 500,000 pigs.

The Washington Post further detailed the US covert war against Cuba in 1979 when it published an article claiming the Pentagon had produced biological agents to use against Cuba's sugar cane and tobacco production. Other suspicious disease outbreaks include haemorraghic conjunctivitis, dengue fever, dysentery, ulcerative mammillitis, black sigatoka, and citric sapper blight, to name but a few. In 1977, CIA documents disclosed that the Agency "maintained a clandestine anti-crop warfare research program targeted during the 1960s at a number of countries throughout the world," according to the Washington Post.

"In 1984, Eduardo Arocena, leader of the terrorist group OMEGA-7, admitted to an American jury that he had taken part in operations to introduce deadly viruses into Cuba as part of a secret biological warfare programme against Havana," writes Marcia Miranda. Arocena was trained in the use of explosives by Cuban exiles who were trained by the CIA.
More:
http://raceandhistory.com/selfnews/viewnews.cgi?newsid1066077200,66752,.shtml

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org.nyud.net:8090/belligerence/arocena-1.jpg

Eduardo Arocena


Trial transcript, etc. of Eduardo Victor Arocena Perez:
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/arocena.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~


This terrorist is mentioned in this report:
In the trial held in the United States in 1984 against Eduardo Arocena, a
ringleader of the terrorist organization Omega-7, he publicly confessed to having
introduced germs into Cuba and admitted that hemorrhagic dengue fever had been
introduced in the island through related groups of Cuban origin, based in the
United States.
(snip)

There is a mountain of evidence, background information and facts that cannot
possibly be ignored.

What is beyond question is that, in just a few weeks, the hemorrhagic dengue
epidemic in Cuba --where it had never existed-- had affected a total of 344,203
people, a figure with no known precedent in any other country of the world. There
was another truly record case when 11,400 new patients were reported in a single
day on July 6, 1981.

A total of 116,143 cases were hospitalized. About 24,000 patients suffered from
hemorrhaging and 10,224 suffered some degree of dengue-induced shock.

One hundred and fifty-eight people died as a result of the epidemic, including 101
children.

The whole country and all its resources were mobilized to fight the epidemic. The
vector's presence was strongly and simultaneously controlled in all of Cuba's towns
and cities, using all possible means and with products and equipment urgently
bought from anywhere, including the United States. A request was made to the United
States through the Pan-American Health Organization and finally, in the month of
August, an important larvicide could be bought. Chemicals and equipment were
brought in, often by plane and sometimes from countries as far away as Japan, whose
factories sold Cuba thousands of individual motor fumigators. Malathion had to be
brought from Europe at a transportation fee of 5,000 dollars a ton, that is, three
and a half times the cost of the product.

In addition to the existing hospital network, dozens of boarding schools were
turned into hospitals in order to isolate every new patient reported, without
exception. At the same time, intensive-care units were built and equipped in all of
the country's children hospitals.

This is how the last infected case was reported on October 10, 1981.

If it had not been for this enormous effort, tens of thousands of people, the vast
majority of them children, would have died. An epidemic that many experts had
forecast would take years to eradicate was defeated in little more than four
months. The adverse economic impact was also considerable.

The list of the dead as a result of the epidemic is authenticated through the
corresponding certifications issued by the Ministry of Public Health, and attached
as document number 22.
More:
http://everything2.com/e2node/Cuba%2520vs.%2520US%2520Govt%253A%2520part%25205



Cuban diplomat Felix Garc’a Rodr’guez was murdered
at a traffic light in New York City on the sixth
anniversary of Omega 7's founding. Photo: Courtesy Granma

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Apparently they are dragging in Joe Lieberman on this, as well.
Terrorist Arocena's wife meets Senator Joe Lieberman

See the article below about Senator Joseph Lieberman's meeting with the
wife of one of the most notorious Cuban-American terrorists, Eduardo
Arocena. I believe he is the only one not walking free in Miami or New
Jersey.

On September 11, 1974, Cuban-American Eduardo Arocena (known as "Omar")
and three other men established Omega 7 to carry out terrorist activities
against Cuba. They assassinated people who promoted dialogue with Cuba,
including Eulalio José Negrín in New Jersey and Carlos Muñiz Varela in
Puerto Rico. They set off numerous bombs for years. For example on
September 11-12, 1981, Omega 7 claimed responsibility for bomb blasts that
destroyed the Mexican consulate in Miami and damaged the one in New York
City because Mexico had not broken relations with Cuba.

They seemed to like to commit terrorism especially on September 11,
perhaps because that is the date of the overthrow of the Allende government
in Chile in 1973.
(Omega 7 was involved in the murders of Orlando Letelier
and Ronni Moffett.)


On September 11, 1980, Arocena shot to death Cuban diplomat Félix
García Rodríguez who had stopped for a red light in Queens, forcing the FBI
(who had trained Omega 7) to arrest some Omega 7 members because of the
international outcry from other UN diplomats.

Arocena carried out at least one biological weapon attack, most likely
dengue fever; he testified in his murder trial that he took “some germs” to
Cuba. He said he thought the germs were to be used against Soviet people in
Cuba and was disappointed to learn that they were used against Cubans.

On September 22, 1984, Arocena was found guilty of the assassination of
Félix García and the attempted assassination of Cuban Ambassador to the
United Nations Raúl Roa Kourí. The federal jury in New York City found him
guilty of 25 of the 26 charges against him, including 20 bombings, perjury
(lying to a federal grand jury when he denied involvement in the 1979 murder
of Eulalio José Negrín), and financing his operations by being an enforcer
for a Florida drug trafficker. Then a federal jury in Miami found him
guilty of all 23 weapons and conspiracy charges against him. In a second
federal trial in Miami, the jury convicted him of all 24 counts involving
seven bombings in Miami from 1979 until 1983.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/message/88453
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Judi Lynn Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 11:20 AM
Response to Original message
4. No doubt George W. Bush will pardon this killer, too, just as he pardoned the two
Edited on Tue Jul-29-08 11:29 AM by Judi Lynn
Cuban "exile" killers, Virgilio Paz Romero and Jose Dionisio Suarez, who bombed Chilean diplomat Orlando Letellier in broad daylight on the streets of Washington, D.C., killing both him, and his American aide, Ronnie Moffit, and injuring her husband who was also in the car. Letelier had previously been tortured by the Pinochet regime.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com.nyud.net:8090/images/2007/06/26/nyregion/Orlando-Letelier.jpg http://www.memoriaviva.com.nyud.net:8090/ejecutados/Ejecutados%20M/Imagenes_EJE_M/moffit_ronnie_4.jpg

Orlando Letelier and aide Ronnie Moffitt

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org.nyud.net:8090/orlando_letelier_260.jpg



Memorial on the Washington, D.C. street
marking the September 21 assassination


Please check: "The coddled "terrorists" of South Florida"
Anti-Castro Cuban exiles who have been linked to bombings and assassinations are living free in Miami. Does the U.S. government have a double standard when it comes to terror?
By Tristram Korten and Kirk Nielsen

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/01/14/cuba/print.html#

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AlphaCentauri Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 11:34 AM
Response to Original message
5. Warning for future Osama Ben Laden pardon petitions
the same group will see on Osama a war hero against the soviets.
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Judi Lynn Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 12:11 PM
Response to Original message
6. You have to hand it to the "exile" terrorists: they have no trouble whatsoever in planting bombs,
or in coming from out of nowhere with machine guns to murder people at stop signs near their work, where they are known to go each and every workday.

That really takes a lot of courage, doesn't it, preying on completely unsuspecting, unarmed people who never see you coming?

This kind of terrorist has been able to spread a lot of fear for the C.I.A., and small wonder. Their victims are not trained in warfare.

When they start spreading biological warfare material in communities in Cuba, knocking off any and everyone randomly, killing their animals, destroying their crops, just to terrorize, the game is over. You don't know how to defend against this kind of weapon, other than get really watchful of anyone who comes in and out of your country.
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ngant17 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 03:52 PM
Response to Original message
7. Terrorism is simply nothing new
especially when it has been practiced by the US government or their trained killers from foreign countries. For example, practical manuals on how to conduct terrorist operations have been printed by the CIA, refer to one classic example, the so-called "assassination manual", aka Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual, which was among other things, disgusting methods of torture techniques and it was recommende and implemented by the CIA in training the Contras in Nicaragua, this fact came to the general public around 1984.

So what's the ruckus about this new war, "counter-terrorism"? The US goverment invested heavily in the terrorist business during the 1980s. So it's not anything new. At least as far as the US gov. should be concerned. It has only been formalized since the 9-11 disaster, and I would call it more of a LIHOP-type of disaster than any kind of real planned or organized attack against the US.

But again, as far as terrorism goes, historically the US government has more expertise in conducting terrorist operations than any other government in the world. And it's most evident in the Cuban exile movement based primarily in South Florida since the early 1960s.

It's absolutely dispicable that anyone should ever consider that a killer like that, being released into free society again, to do again what he was always trained to do -- destroy innocent people and to frighten and cower the survivors into submission. This unfortunately is about double-standards, and it frankly is not surprising to me that it would happen under the wretched type of government which we have today.
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MisterP Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Jul-29-08 05:40 PM
Response to Original message
8. in '86, the gusanos declared that if democracy got in the way of fighting the Reds,
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