On May 9, two
days before he was to stand trial on minor immigration fraud charges in El Paso, Texas, notorious
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles was cleared of all
charges by a U.S.
federal judge. He is now a free man although his whereabouts are not currently
known.
This latest manoeuvre in the case of Posada has caused an international
uproar, and the U.S.
has been forced to offer some kind of explanation. In an open debate on
terrorism in the UN Security Council two weeks ago, Cuban Ambassador Ileana
Nunez and Venezuelan Ambassador Francisco Arias held the U.S. responsible for freeing Posada, who was the
acknowledged mastermind behind the mid-air explosion of a Cuban airliner in
October 1976, as well as many other documented crimes against Cuba and other countries.
In response to
this accusation, the U.S. Ambassador, ZalmayKhalilzad, said that the U.S.
is bound by its laws not to extradite Posada to either Venezuela, from where he escaped from custody
while facing charges for the 1976 bombing, or to Cuba, the country where he was
born.The U.S. law Khalilzad
is referring to is one that forbids extradition to a country where the accused
is likely to face torture. The justification of this law in the case of Posada
is highly ironic, considering that the U.S. military is well known as an
inflictor of torture in Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, and many other places, as well as a supporter of
many regimes where torture has been openly practiced, while there are no
instances of torture by the Cuban or Venezuelan governments or their
militaries.
On May 22, the
counselor for the Cuban permanent mission to the UN, Rodolfo Benitez, formally
responded to Khalilzad’s comments. He pointed out
that the U.S.
had allowed Posada to freely enter its territory, and had protected him during
the months he lived there as an illegal immigrant. He also questioned why
Posada was charged only with minor immigration crimes when the authorities had
all the evidence necessary to charge him with being a terrorist. Even now,
after his full exoneration, Benitez pointed out, the U.S. has all the legal mechanisms
in place to re-arrest him.
Benitez also
denounced the continuing campaign of terror against Cuba from within the U.S.,
primarily in Miami, and the huge amounts of money that are raised to commit
these acts against Cuba. “Bank accounts that finance terrorism are operating
openly and normally; terrorists are recruited; the acquisition of weapons is
permitted, as is the use of territory by those who finance, plan and commit
acts of terrorism against Cuba,” he stated.
Posada Carriles participated not only in attacks against Cuba, but
also in other actions, such as Operation Condor, a campaign of kidnappings,
torture, assassinations and forced disappearances carried out by Latin American
dictatorships with the backing of the CIA. He was also responsible for a string
of bombings of Havana
hotels in 1997, in one of which an Italian-Canadian, Fabio DiCelmo, was killed.