Cuba’s Enemy No. 1 Goes on Trial in Texas

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Hispanically Speaking News

Cuba’s Enemy No. 1 Goes on Trial in Texas.
Published at 10:21 am, January 11, 2011

Attorneys in Texas are in the process of selecting the twelve people that will make up the jury in the trial of Fidel Castro’s number one nemesis, Luis Posada Carriles.

The 82 year-old ex-CIA operative is accused of perjury and obstruction of justice for allegedly lying about how he arrived in the U.S., and about whether he tried to cover up his involvement in the 1997 Havana hotel bombings so he could obtain U.S. citizenship.

Posada claimed to have entered the U.S.in 2007 by crossing the Mexican border into Texas. Prosecutors say he actually arrived in Miami on the boat of friend, and using a fake passport. Although he pleaded not guilty, Posada noted that for years he entered the U.S. under false identities while working with the CIA and other organizations.

“The people who worked with me from the government are not the same the ones there today. It was other times. For those there today, I am a bad guy,” he acknowledged.

Read more: http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews.com/notitas-de-noticias/details/cubas-enemy-no.-1-goes-on-trial-in-texas/4215/

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

1. THAT, ladies and gentlemen, is a Terrorist with a capital T.

As in, Bin Laden level.

He's the real deal.

[Judi Lynn]

2. Posada Carriles in court: Coalition cites trial an act of 'hypocrisy'

Posada Carriles in court: Coalition cites trial an act of 'hypocrisy'
by Aileen B. Flores \ El Paso Times
Posted: 01/10/2011 12:00:00 AM MST

~snip~
Brian Becker, national director of ANSWER, called for the extradition to Venezuela of Posada Carriles during a tribunal Sunday at the Unitarian Universalist Community of El Paso.

The government of Venezuela is seeking Posada's extradition in connection with the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people, known as the Cubana Flight 455.

Panama officials also want to extradite Posada Carriles on charges that he plotted to kill Fidel Castro during Castro's visit to the country in 2000. Posada has denied the allegations.

Becker said the U.S. government knows Posada Carriles is a terrorist. Becker said Posada Carriles acted under the umbrella of the Central Intelligence Agency and U.S. government when he planned the attack on the Cuban airplane in 1976 and the hotel bombings in Havana that killed Italian businessman Fabio Di Celmo in the 1990s.

By hosting this trial, the U.S. is protecting Posada Carriles from revealing the truth, Becker said.

More:
http://www.elpasotimes.com/newupdated/ci_17053222?source=pkg

[DissedByBush]

9. At least we agree when it comes to this guy

Even if his end goal was to take down a murderous dictator, he himself became a murderer of innocents and a terrorist. The ends do not justify the means.

The anti-Castro lobby in this country does have too much power regardless of the administration in place.

It is the only reason I can see in a non-Bush presidency for not charging him with murder and terrorism. He should die in prison.

Maybe Italy can get some balls and have him extradited for the murder of Di Celmo.

[social_critic]

3. Cuba's Number one enemy is Fidel Castro

Posada Carriles is a bad guy. But he's small potatoes compared to Fidel Castro, who has been and remains Cuba's number one enemy.

[dipsydoodle]

5. Twaddle

.

[ngant17]

6. I don't understand this incoherent sentence

The Republic of Cuba is not at war with Fidel Castro. And no way can Fidel Castro ever be an enemy of the Republic of Cuba.

Posada has chosen his method of operation, it is not peace, nor democracy or civil discourse. He was enabled by covert operations of the US government, mainly the CIA. I'm sure there are many other US secret agencies which crossed path with him in some manner. Without their systemic help, he would not have ever gone very far in the terrorist business.

[social_critic]

14. I didn't say "The Republic of Cuba"

I said Fidel Castro was Cuba's number one enemy. The Cuban government has been ruled by this man for almost 50 years. Today, he continues to wield enormous power even if he's an old man missing a portion of his digestive tract - plus his younger brother Raul took over the government. Raul is a lot better than Fidel - he's trying to change the system away from communism. But Fidel has a lot of power. And this power has been used to create a repressive society, poor, and with a deep sense of hopelessness for most of its citizens.

[Taverner]

16. AHEM BULLSHIT!!!

Castro never blew up passenger planes like Carriles did

[Bacchus39]

18. haha bravo n/t

s

[Bragi]

20. Cubans disagree

I've been to Cuba numerous times. Everyone complains about the government, but far as I can tell, they truly revere Fidel.

[martymar64]

58. The people that still live in Cuba would disagree

You think Batista was better loved by the Cuban people?

[DissedByBush]

4. On trial for the wrong thing

Put him up for terrorism and murder!

[robcon]

7. I think the Castro brothers are Cuba's #1 and #2 enemies.

Keeping the people down and keeping out democracy and freedom in their police state seems to be their only agenda.

[harmonicon]

8. The Cuban people disagree, but I guess that's why they vote there and you don't. (nt)

[Bragi]

21. Quite so /nt

[MellowDem]

24. They can't vote for their national leader... nt

[Judi Lynn]

25. Parliamentary system, or didn't you know? He's elected by the legislature.

Why don't you ridicule Canada, or England, etc.?

[MellowDem]

27. Who was ridiculing?

I guess if England and Canada had only one party that kept the same guy year after year, then his brother, I guess you'd have a point too.

[ProudDad]

34. They do

Just like USAmerica they play a game of switch between the two-right-wings of their Big Business Party too...

When the people get tired of one flavor of corporate rule they switch to the other...

[MellowDem]

38. There's certainly more choice than in the US system... nt

[robcon]

41. When did the Cuban people choose?

The laughable exercises called "elections" don't offer anyone who disagrees with the head of the Cuban Police State.

[ProudDad]

53. That's funny...

The ONLY police I saw in Cuba was the unarmed gentleman in uniform who came to the aid of a bicycle riding accident victim...

He made sure that the poor fellow who accidentally hit her took her to the closest neighborhood clinic for immediate care (she wasn't seriously hurt)...

No insurance cards. No arrests and/or beatings...

For Police State bullshit you need go no further than the belly of the beast here in the USAmerican Empire...

[Judi Lynn]

54. Other DU'ers who've been to Cuba also have mentioned cops in that scary police state aren't armed.

How the heck will they be able to brutalize you then throw you in prison?

Maybe the ones of us who haven't gone, yet, should just forget everything we hear from people who have actually been there, openly, and freely, and put all our faith in those who haven't gone, and get their material from the right-wing propaganda spew.

[martymar64]

59. Did they get to choose Castro's predecessor, Batista?

Are you claiming the Cuban people were better off under the Batista regime?

What was Batista's army and secret police body count amongst civilians versus Castro's? Were people more free under the Batista regime? Did the people love or even like Batista? How did Batista treat dissidents?

What was the literacy rate under Batista vs Castro? Health care? Infant mortality?

Under what metrics was Batista better than Castro?

[ProudDad]

52. And you know this how?

You've been there and examined the system and talked to the people I suppose...

Didn't think so...

[unkachuck]

10. "...For those there today, I am a bad guy,..."

"...he was linked to a 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that took off from Venezuela."

....yes, blowing up a civilian airliner, by definition, makes you a bad guy....

....but apparently not bad enough, since we won't extradite him to Venezuela or Cuba to stand trial for the crime...

[Octafish]

11. CIA-connected terrorists blew up an airliner, and a former ambassador and American woman in DC...

Poppy’s CIA warned about terror plots and did not stop them

[unkachuck]

12. thank you, Octafish....n/t

[Judi Lynn]

13. So glad you posted your thread, since I missed it the 1st time. Bookmarked. Thanks. n/t

[DissedByBush]

15. We could try him here

Universal jurisdiction exists for crimes considered so heinous.

I do understand the hesitancy to send anyone to Venezuela or Cuba.

Yeah, yeah, Guantanamo, torture, blah blah. It's nothing compared to the REAL torture and depraved conditions he'd endure if sent there. The standard fare for Cuban political prisoners makes Guantanamo look downright benign. That's aside from the fact that if Chavez or Castro tell the courts he's guilty, then there's no doubt he'll be found guilty (judges do value their lives and positions). It would be a show trial.

Okay, I admit I do get a bit of a smile thinking of him going through that. He deserves the worst. But then I remember we're not supposed to extradite people to such places.

[U4ikLefty]

19. "Yeah, yeah, Guantanamo, torture, blah blah"

typical

[Bragi]

22. I think I'd prefer a Cuban jail to a US Supermax

Choices, choices.

[DissedByBush]

28. You might want to pick the US supermax

The story of a recently released prisoner, from Netherlands media:

http://www.rnw.nl/international-justice/article/cuba-a-story-horrible-prison-conditions

"The circumstances in the Cuban prisons are inhuman. They are overloaded and each prisoner has less than halve a square meter to live on. The corridors are overcrowded and a lot of prisoners are forced to sleep on the ground, because of a lack of beds. The food is scarce and has no nutritional value. Chicken is the only food that contains a bit of protein, which they only serve twice a month.

They don’t pay any attention to the prisoners and there is practically no medical help. I was located in one of the most severe prisons near Havana, together with two thousand other convicts. For these two thousand men, there were only six or seven doctors, and, for example, no possibility to realize blood tests, or to treat patients with diabetes. (…) Also for healthy prisoners it is hard to avoid illness considering the bad nutrition and the stress."

This isn't the equivalent of a supermax or Guantanamo. It's just a prison over there.

[ProudDad]

36. Good luck getting adequate medical care

in a USAmerican jail or prison...

As for nutrition, it's crap in US prisons and jails too...

And a U.S. Supermax is just a torture chamber, a breeding ground for psychosis.

Think The Count of Monte Cristo... or Dr. Manette from Tale of Two Cities...

[DissedByBush]

39. Did you read?

No treatment if you're a diabetic. Food sucking is not a comparison to not getting enough. Chicken at most a couple times a week as your protein?

And this isn't even a supermax, a place for the most violent and dangerous prisoners.

This is a place for common criminals and those who disagreed with Castro.

[ProudDad]

42. There are more political prisoners in the USAmerikan Empire

than there are in Cuba...per capita...

[DissedByBush]

43. I believe we have one political prisoner

He is Leonard Peltier. You'd have to stretch the definition pretty far to get any reasonable number of "political prisoners" here in the US.

And he's still in a better place than what Cuban dissidents have to endure.

[ProudDad]

45. In a police state like USAmerica...

a rather large percentage of folks in the jails and prisons are "political" prisoners...

Especially since the laws are biased in such a way as to serve as a voter suppression measure...

Every "felon" whose franchise has been robbed from them for life is a "political prisoner"...

Most of the "political prisoners" in Cuba were paid operatives of USAmerica (you have hear of the NED, right?) and would be called spies and traitors here in the Empire and treated just as bad or worse...

And you spend some time in solitary confinement and THEN come back and discuss prison conditions, ok?

[DissedByBush]

49. Vastly stretching the definition as I thought

You need someone in jail because they displeased the regime, because they spoke out against it.

That is plentiful in Cuba. Extremely rare here.

[ProudDad]

51. It's extremely rare in Cuba, too

As long as you don't take dirty USAmerican money to do your sabotage, you are not likely to be locked up in Cuba either.

When I was there I talked to quite a few people who had no love for the regime and felt entirely free to say so...

Of course, they WERE Socialist and Communitarian so they indicated their solidarity with Cuba and her People even if they were frustrated with some the details of the government.

I stand by my statement that there are more political prisoners per capita in the dungeons of the USAmerican Empire than there are in Cuba...

[DissedByBush]

57. Sabotage

Their sabotage is filling people's minds with ideas of freedom and human rights.

And there are hundreds of people in prison in Cuba simply because they dared oppose Castro.

The US does sometimes send money to help dissidents. That's a good thing, helping freedom.

Your statement is bullshit. By any standard definition of political prisoner, the US has almost none.

But Cuba is loaded with them.

Half of DU would have been in prison during the Bush reign if we'd been in Cuba saying the same things about Castro.

[ProudDad]

46. Here are five more USAmerican political prisoners...

http://www.freethefive.org/

And don't forget Manuel Noriega -- whose "crime" was to stop working for the CIA...

And there are many more like them...

[DissedByBush]

48. "The five" committed crimes

Spying, and they helped shoot down an unarmed civilian plane that made the big mistake of dropping leaflets about human rights on Cuba.

Okay, I'll give you Noriega too.

That makes two, in a population of 300 million.

[ProudDad]

50. No, the Cuban Five did NOT commit "crimes"

The Cuban Five had NOTHING to do with downing that provocative airplane. (Imagine what the USAmerican War Machine would do to any Cuban Cessna that tried to do the same over Miami!!!)

They spied on the right-wing Cuban militia; remember? The assholes who have been involved in blowing up airliners and hotels in Havana...

The ones who harbored Posada...

The Cuban Five did NOT spy on any USAmerican installations or activities -- except possibly the CIA's dirty dealings.

That's SEVEN!

.....

And I would count every drug USER who's in jail or prison as a political prisoner. That's about 600,000 otherwise innocent persons locked up for smoking pot or crack...

[DissedByBush]

55. They spied on American military installations

And specifically helped Cuba shoot down that plane.

Why else were they instructed not to be on the flights of certain days, and to notify the Cuban intelligence service if they could not avoid being on the flights?

"And I would count every drug USER who's in jail or prison as a political prisoner."

And while I would agree our drug war is bullshit, so is that statement. They're in jail for the drugs, not for speaking out against the administration.

[martymar64]

60. IFAIMC, Marijuana prisoners are political prisoners

I know we have a shitload of people in prison for breaking a law that has no compelling reason to be there. The harm from marijuana prohibition is a greater harm to society than marijuana itself is.
The laws are on the books to create felons that cannot vote, as stated earlier.

The laws against weed are still on the books for purely political reasons. That makes all those people political prisoners in a technical sense.

[DissedByBush]

61. Putting people in prison for marijuana is absurd

But those people are still most definitely not political prisoners.

You're mixing up garden variety stoners with courageous people around the world who risk their lives and freedom to speak out against their government.

[ProudDad]

47. Prison Conditions? (from your article)

Lancaster, California...Just another day in an overcrowded USAmerican prison...



"The circumstances in the Cuban prisons are inhuman. They are overloaded and each prisoner has less than halve a square meter to live on."

http://www.rnw.nl/international-justice/article/cuba-a-story-horrible-prison-conditions

Oh, really? That's a square 2 feet per side...not likely...


"They don’t pay any attention to the prisoners and there is practically no medical help. I was located in one of the most severe prisons near Havana, together with two thousand other convicts. For these two thousand men, there were only six or seven doctors, and, for example, no possibility to realize blood tests, or to treat patients with diabetes. (…) Also for healthy prisoners it is hard to avoid illness considering the bad nutrition and the stress."

San Quentin with nearly 4000 prisoners -- 1 or two doctors and it's nearly impossible to get seen by one...without bleeding...

"These miserable circumstances consequently lead to a lot of violence. Each week a bloody incident occurs, when prisoners are in conflict with sick people who are no longer accountable. Furthermore, all prisoners live under an inhumane military regime which damages their dignity. There is no medical or spiritual help."

Sounds like every prison or jail in USAmerica -- except in USAmerica they let the American Taliban Christianists (ONLY) in to proselytize...

"The prisoners are completely defenseless. When a group of eight or ten soldiers is beating up a prisoner, people remain silent. They pick him up and throw him in a cell two by two square meter cell and leave him there for days."

Cell Extraction anyone? The predators are in charge of "inmate discipline" in US prisons! Who needs guards to beat up the prisoners when the most violent of the prisoners are empowered to do it while the guards look the other way?

"Because of a serious lack of hygiene in the prisons, contagious diseases are spread, consequently causing epidemics."

AIDS is a pandemic in USAmerican prisons thanks to inmate rape and the lousy health care.

[DissedByBush]

56. About as much room as I had in Basic Training in the Army

Do you really want me posting pictures of Cuban hell-holes?

[Judi Lynn]

29. So would anyone not on the propaganda spinner payroll. From the Harvard Criminal Justice Institute

director, Soffiyah Elijah:

CUBA: A humane prison system
Wednesday, September 6, 2000 - 11:00

Since the island nation of Cuba experienced its successful revolution in 1959 its prison system has been evolving. Despite accusations of harsh human rights abuses from its neighbours to the north, Cuba today maintains a prison system that is in many respects far more humane than Western propaganda would have the uninformed public believe.

My study of the Cuban prison system began in 1987 when I first visited the country to attend a conference co-sponsored by the American Association of Jurists and the Cuban Association of Jurists.

I was pleasantly surprised during the trip when the opportunity arose to visit a men's prison.

A group of conference attendees travelled by bus to the prison and when we arrived we were not searched and our belongings were not checked. We did not sign in or out. Nobody asked to check our identification.

Having visited numerous prisons in the United States, I have never entered any of them without a thorough search of my person and my belongings. Government issued photo identification is always required.

More:
http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/21498

~~~~~
J. Soffiyah Elijah serves as Deputy Director of the Criminal Justice Institute (CJI) at Harvard Law School (HLS). In her capacity as Deputy Director at CJI, she is both an administrator and a clinical instructor. As an administrator, Ms. Elijah is responsible for leading the fulfillment, development and expansion of the Institute’s work to address the urgent needs of the powerless, voiceless and indigent in the criminal justice system. As a clinical instructor, a position she has held at CJI since 1999, she supervises third-year law students in the representation of adult and juvenile clients in the Roxbury and Dorchester Divisions of the Boston Municipal Court. Under Ms. Elijah’s leadership, HLS won the 2004 National Criminal Justice Trial Advocacy Competition, the same Competition at which HLS placed second in 2003. Ms. Elijah’s leadership proved victorious again in March 2005; her legal expertise helped secure the release of a CJI client who had been incarcerated for 31 years.

Prior to coming to Harvard Law School, Ms. Elijah was a member of the faculty at the City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law. She served as Director and Supervising Attorney of the Defender Clinic. At the Child Welfare Advocacy Fellowship Program, where she also served as Director and Supervising Attorney, Ms. Elijah directed the development of law students to work as creative advocates in New York City’s child welfare system. In addition, Professor Elijah taught courses in criminal procedure and juvenile rights.

Ms. Elijah practiced law through various avenues before transitioning into the clinical practice of academia. She was a Supervising Attorney at the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem (NDS), where she defended indigent members of the Harlem, New York community. Before joining NDS, Ms. Elijah was in private practice, specializing in criminal defense and family law. She also worked as a Staff Attorney for the Juvenile Rights Division of the Legal Aid Society.

With more than 20 years in the legal profession, the scope of her interests and scholarship is diverse. Prof. Elijah has authored several articles and publications based on her research of the U.S. criminal justice and prison systems. She has represented numerous political prisoners and social activists over the past 18 years. And, her travels to Cuba over the past 13 years have enabled her to conduct extensive research on the country’s legal system, with a focus on its approach to criminal justice issues. Ms. Elijah was awarded a Revson Fellowship at Columbia University to continue research in her areas of interest. Prof. Elijah’s current research and scholarship focuses on criminal justice issues and the prison industrial complex.

More:
http://www.law.harvard.edu/academics/clinical/cji/staff/elijah.htm

[snooper2]

32. From Human Rights Watch

Prison Conditions
Prisoners are generally kept in poor and abusive conditions, often in overcrowded cells. Political prisoners who denounce poor conditions or who otherwise fail to observe prison rules are frequently punished with long periods in punitive isolation cells, restrictions on visits, or denial of medical treatment.


http://www.hrw.org/en/node/79343

[ProudDad]

37. That is exactly as it is in a U.S. Supermax...

or any prison or jail in California...

[DissedByBush]

33. Another sucker

Who bought the lie of the model prison she was allowed to visit.

Let me guess, she wasn't allowed to pick a sampling of prisons to visit.

This is one of the oldest tricks in the book for communist countries.

[ProudDad]

35. "The standard fare for Cuban political prisoners makes Guantanamo look downright benign"

and you know this how?

When is the last time a Guantanamo prisoner received a visit from their family?

When is the last time that most of them got any kind of trial?

You really don't know what you're talking about...

[DissedByBush]

40. The treatment

Guantanamo prisoners are kept in clean conditions with adequate food and medical care. This is quite the opposite from a Cuban prison.

As far as trial, that is funny. No trial vs. a show trial for speaking up against Castro. At least no trial is a more honest position.

[Judi Lynn]

17. Short, focused biography of this scum:

Luis Posada was born in Cuba in 1928. He became a pediatrician in Havana. An opponent of Fidel Castro, Posada was a leading figure in JURE, a political party led by Manolo Rey. He took part in the Bay of Pigs. According to Gaeton Fonzi (The Last Investigation), Posada was a former lieutenant in the United States Army, where he took an intelligence staff officer course.

Posada worked for the Central Intelligence Agency until 1967. He then moved to Venezuela where he became chief of security and counterintelligence in the secret police, DISIP.

In 1971 Posada worked with William C. Bishop and Antonio Veciana in the plot to assassinate Fidel Castro on a visit to Caracas on 31st November. As well as providing all the credentials necessary to get the assassins into Venezuela, Posada also planted phony documents so that if the two men were killed, the trail would lead to two Russian agents in Caracas. After the fall of President Carlos Andre Perez, Posada started his own private security agency.

On 25th November 1975, leaders of the military intelligence services of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay met, with Juan Manuel Contreras in Santiago de Chile. The main objective was for the CIA to coordinate the actions of the various security services in "eliminating Marxist subversion". Operation Condor was given tacit approval by the United States which feared a Marxist revolution in the region. The targets were officially leftist guerrillas but in fact included all kinds of political opponents. Posada soon became involved in this undercover operation.

In October, 1976, the midair explosion of Cubana Flight 455 flying out of Barbados killed all 73 people aboard. This included all 24 young athletes on Cuba's gold-medal fencing team. Police in Trinidad arrested two Venezuelans, Herman Ricardo and Freddy Lugo. Ricardo worked for Posada's security agency in Venezuela and admitted that he and Lugo had planted two bombs on the plane. Ricardo claimed the bombing had been organized by Posada and Orlando Bosch. When Posada was arrested he was found with a map of Washington showing the daily route of to work of Orlando Letelier, the former Chilean Foreign Minister, who had been assassinated on 21st September, 1976.

More:
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKposada.htm

~~~~~
Luis Posada Carriles: When Injustice is Justice
Written by Tom Crumpacker
Sunday, 16 October 2005 19:30

By way of background, what is known publicly about Posada is that as a young man he worked in Havana in enforcement for the Batista regime, and came to US in 1960. In the CIA directed Bay of Pigs invasion, he and his partner Orlando Bosch joined CIA Operation 40, made up of sharpshooters whose job was to murder the leaders of Cuba's government. When the invasion failed, the CIA sent him to Ft. Benning, Ga. ("School of the Americas") where he was trained in explosives and interrogation by torture. Allegedly, Posada was seen in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, on November 22, 1963, the place and day Lee Harvey Oswald killed John F. Kennedy. During the 1960's Posada was involved in CIA's Operation Mongoose (murderous incursions into Cuba). He also ran the CIA's demolition school in Florida and made several deadly forays into other countries, such as blowing up the Soviet library in Mexico City, the Cuban embassies in Argentina, Peru and Portugal and the Costa Rica-Cuba Cultural center. In 1972 CIA sent him to Caracas with substantial bomb making materials and equipment to work with the Venezuelan intelligence agency, DISIP. The head of DISIP, one Joachim Chaffardet, made Posada the chief of his "special services," which involved teaching demolitions and interrogation by torture.

In 1975 Posada left DISIP and opened a detective agency in Caracas (in reality a CIA cover) with Chaffardet as his silent partner. On October 6, the two employees of the agency, former DISIP agents Lugar and Ricardo, placed a bomb in the restroom of a civilian Cubana airliner which blew up in midair after leaving Barbados for Havana, killing all 73 civilians aboard. After apprehension, Lugar and Ricardo confessed that Posada and Bosch had directed the operation, and this participation is confirmed by recently declassified parts of CIA, FBI and State Department reports. All four were charged in Venezuela, the other three were convicted, but Posada escaped in 1985 shortly before his verdict was to be rendered. CIA allegedly bribed the guards. Venezuelan law prevented proceeding with Posada's case in his absence.

Posada went directly to work in El Salvador in the Iran-Contra drugs-supply operation being run out of El Salvador by CIA agent Felix Rodriguez (who had killed Che Guevara in Bolivia in 1967) and by Col. Oliver North out of the White House. Subsequently Posada helped in Operation Condor (involving CIA, DISIP and DINA, the Chilean intelligence service), which exterminated many South American progressives. He also worked as security agent for the Guatemalan dictatorship in the late 1980's. From El Salvador he masterminded and directed the 1997 Havana tourist hotel bombings. He was finally caught in 2000 in Panama City with 37 lb. of C-4 explosives in his car, intending to kill Castro and hundreds of students at a speech to be given at a local university. Last year the US friendly president of Panama pardoned Posada and his three Miami cohorts, and he returned to US this March. After a Miami press conference in May, Homeland Security took him into custody and charged him with failure to report to them on entry.

In reviewing Posada's publicly known career, the Bush family name occasionally appears. In 1960 Bush Senior was running his oil company, Zapata Drilling, out of Houston. He was also recruiting for the CIA's planned Bay of Pigs invasion, and some CIA meetings allegedly were held in Zapata offices. Bush Senior was critical of the Kennedy Administration's effort therein and he urged a new invasion of Cuba. A memo by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover dated 11/28/63 refers to him as "George Bush of the CIA." In 1976, when Bush Senior was made CIA Director, he put in charge of CIA special operations the head of the Miami CIA station, who had been and continued to be Posada's direct supervisor. CIA had urged the various violent anti-Castro groups in Florida and New Jersey, such as Omega 7 and Alpha 66, to merge under one authority, which was called CORU and was headed by Bosch. At that time Zapata had drilling contracts in Venezuela, and Jeb Bush, now governor of Florida, was working for a Texas bank in Caracas. According to the recently declassified reports, CIA, which had offices, operatives and assets in Caracas besides Posada, was at least aware of the two failed attempts to bomb Cubana civilian airliners in the summer of 1976, and about a week before the successful bombing on October 6 it received a report from Posada "We're going to hit the Cuban airliner."

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/cuba-archives-43/72-luis-posada-carriles-when-injustice-is-justice

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

23. Ship him to Canada,

The DC-8 he blew up was owned by Air Canada and only leased to Cubana.

[freshwest]

44. Thanks for the info. What's the Canadian take on this? Do they want him?

[Judi Lynn]

26. Cuban Exile Lied to U.S., Prosecutor Tells Texas Jury

Cuban Exile Lied to U.S., Prosecutor Tells Texas Jury
By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
Published: January 12, 2011

EL PASO — A prosecutor told jurors Wednesday than an elderly Cuban exile lied repeatedly under oath about how he entered the United States and about his role in terrorist attacks in Havana.

The exile, Luis Posada Carriles, 82, is a veteran of the cold war struggles against Fidel Castro who once worked for the C.I.A. and is a suspect in several bombings. He is charged with perjury, obstruction of federal proceedings and making false statements during a naturalization hearing.

Cuba and Venezuela have charged that Mr. Posada was the mastermind behind the downing of a Cuban airliner in 1976 in which 73 people were killed. Both governments also claim that he orchestrated a series of bombings in Havana in 1997, killing a tourist.

Timothy J. Reardon, the lead prosecutor, told the jury in his opening argument that Mr. Posada was not on trial for his opposition to the Cuban government. But he said he would show that Mr. Posada lied during a deportation hearing in 2005 when he said he had not recruited the bombers who carried out the attacks in Cuba.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/13/us/13carriles.html

[Judi Lynn]

30. Cuban-born terrorist Luis Posada Carriles's day in court may be here

Cuban-born terrorist Luis Posada Carriles's day in court may be here
Albor Ruiz - Ny Local

Thursday, January 13th 2011, 4:00 AM

He is 82 years old, but a kindly grandfather he is not.

Actually, Cuban-born Luis Posada Carriles, a naturalized Venezuelan and a longtime CIA operative, is a convicted terrorist in two countries who escaped from a Venezuelan jail and was infamously pardoned in Panama.

A dangerous criminal with a long and deadly rap sheet, he is named in U.S. intelligence reports as the mastermind behind the 1976 bombing of Cubana Airlines Fight 455, which killed the 73 passengers on board, including the Cuban national fencing team. Posada Carriles is also linked to a string of hotel bombings in Cuba, resulting in the death of Italian tourist Fabio diCelmo, something he would later brag about in a 1998 New York Times interview.

"The Italian was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but I sleep like a baby," Posada Carriles told the newspaper.

Not a man deterred by small details, he was convicted in 2000 of plotting to assassinate Fidel Castro during a summit in Panama. The plot called for using 200 pounds of dynamite and C-4 explosives to blow up an auditorium - listen to this - packed with college students. He served four years before being pardoned.

More:
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/brooklyn/2011/01/13/2011-01-13_terrorists_day_in_court_may_be_here.html

[Octafish]

31. The CIA File on Posada Carilles

Courtesy of George Washington University's National Security Archives:

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB334/index.htm