Trial of the Terrorist Who Almost Killed Me (Stephen Kinzer on Posada Carriles)

[EFerrari]

A CIA agent, who masterminded the downing of a Cuba-bound flight in 1976 that killed 73 people, goes on trial in the U.S. this week. Stephen Kinzer, who had tickets for the flight, reports.

It was a simple whim that saved my life: I had finished reporting in Barbados quicker than anticipated and so I changed my flight to Havana, getting on an earlier plane. Two days later, a terrorist blew up the Cuba-bound flight I had been booked on.

All 73 people aboard perished.

I would have been the 74th.



On Monday, the man believed to have masterminded this horrific attack in 1976, Luis Posada Carriles, will go on trial in El Paso, Texas. But perhaps because he spent most of his adult life working for the Central Intelligence Agency, he is not being tried for that crime.

Nor is he being judged for his apparent role as mastermind of a string of bombings in Havana, including one at a hotel that killed an Italian tourist. He is only being charged with violating immigration law and obstructing justice.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-01-11/luis-posada-carriles-trial-of-the-terrorist-who-almost-killed-me/