[News] Waiting for Posada Carriles to die

[Anti-Imperialist News]

From: Machetera <missmachetera at gmail.com>


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Waiting for Posada Carriles to die

Posted: 22 Jun 2010 02:30 AM PDT
Telesur (Caracas) ? José Perttierra: “The United 
States would prefer to see Posada Carriles dead 
rather than extradite him.” – <http://ecaminos.org/leer.php/6550>español

Translation: Machetera

José Pertierra, the lawyer representing Venezuela 
in the case of the extradition petition for the 
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, says that the 
U.S. Department of Justice is seeking a 
biological solution for the case.  The solution 
is to prolong the trial, because “the more time 
that passes, the more probable it is that he’ll 
die and do away with the extradition case.”

“That’s why, at every opportunity, the 
prosecution asks for a delay, because the 
solution they’re seeking is a biological 
solution; they’d rather see him dead than 
extradited.  It’s not that they want to kill him, 
but they know that he’s an elderly man and the 
more time that passes, the more probable it is 
that he’ll die and do away with the extradition 
case,” he said in an interview granted to teleSUR.

He also said that the U.S. Government is legally 
obliged to extradite the Cuban-Venezuelan 
terrorist, not to keep him in Miami where he 
takes part in political demonstrations.

Posada Carriles is responsible for the mid-air 
explosion of a Cubana de Aviacion airliner with 
76 people on board in 1976, that had taken off 
from Venezuela for Cuba but after making a stop 
in Barbados was targeted in the plot that led to the extradition request.

The transcript of the teleSUR interview follows:

Does the President of the United States know that 
Luis Posada Carriles is a fugitive from Venezuelan justice?

Yes, he knows, and he protects him anyway.  I 
believe for different reasons than those of 
Bush.  Posada Carriles is a terrorist of the Bush 
family.  When the Cubana airliner blew up in 
1976, Posada worked for the CIA and the head of 
the CIA was Bush Sr.  When he escaped from prison 
in 1985 in San Juan de los Morros, in the state 
of Guárico here in Venezuela, Bush Sr. was 
Vice-President of the United States and 
coincidentally, Posada Carriles began to work for 
the CIA just days after his escape, in an 
operation directed by Bush Sr. that later was known as the Iran-Contra scandal.

Why can’t Barack Obama rid himself of this terrorist?

Power in the United States does not necessarily 
reside in the Oval Office.  The President has a 
certain amount of power, but there’s a lot of 
power in the shadows and within these shadows are 
the Pentagon, the CIA and people who have a lot 
to lose if Posada Carriles is extradited to 
Venezuela and begins to sing like a canary.

We’ve also seen on other occasions that every 
time Posada feels threatened, he threatens to sing.

What could Posada Carriles say that might endanger the U.S. establishment?

Posada’s not your run-of-the-mill terrorist, nor 
is he an ordinary CIA operative.  Posada is a highly placed man within the CIA.

Posada was the CIA’s man in Caracas during the 
1970’s, when he exercised his power as the head 
of special operations for the DISIP (Venezuelan 
intelligence), capturing, torturing and killing 
many here in Venezuela.  He was also the CIA’s 
man in Central America, advising death squads in 
Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras.

He was also a man who on several occasions 
participated in terrorist activities against 
Cuba, including the 1997 bombings, of which he 
himself boasted being the intellectual 
author.  And as Posada’s own attorney says, 
everything he did during those years, he did in Washington’s name.

Therefore, if he talks, he’ll talk about who gave him orders.

What evidence is there that Luis Posada Carriles 
committed crimes in Venezuela?  Are there enough 
classified documents to inculpate him?

We presented more than 2,000 pages of documents 
in support of the extradition request we made, 
which prove that Posada Carriles was the 
intellectual author of the airliner 
explosion.  Among these documents is one that was 
given to the police chief in Trinidad just days 
after the aircraft explosion by one of the 
material authors, Hernan Ricardo, where Ricardo 
says that he placed the bomb on board.  He says 
that he was paid $25,000 to do it and that his boss was Posada Carriles.

We also presented documentation showing telephone 
calls from Trinidad to Caracas by the material 
authors, in which Ricardo is looking for Posada 
Carriles to tell him that the bus ? as they 
referred to the plane ?– had blown up and that 
the dogs had died – code for the passengers – and 
that he was in a huge mess in Trinidad.

There’s an enormous amount of proof.  When Posada 
Carriles’ offices were raided here in Caracas in 
1976, the flight itinerary for Cubana de Aviacion 
was discovered and we continued from there.

The court in El Paso, Texas, has evidence of 
Posada Carriles’ participation in a chain of 
attacks in Cuba in 1997, so why is he being tried 
as a liar and not as a terrorist?

Simply to delay the extradition request that 
Venezuela has presented.  The United States is 
obliged by international law and the 
international conventions signed by the United 
States and Venezuela to either extradite Posada 
or try him in U.S. territory for his crimes.

Since this legal obligation exists, the only way 
that the U.S. government can delay is to try him 
for something else and drag out the decision on 
his extradition, and that’s what they’re doing with this case.

That’s why the prosecutor asks for an extension 
at every opportunity, because the solution that 
they’re seeking is a biological solution; they’d 
prefer to see him dead rather than extradited.

It’s not that they want to kill him, but they 
know that he’s an elderly man and the more time 
that passes, the more probable it is that he’ll 
die and do away with the extradition case.

If they extradite him, the fear is that he’ll sing.

The prosecutor even went to Cuba to obtain 
evidence from the 1997 string of bombings on the island.

At the end of January, the prosecutor went to 
Havana to look for the evidence about Posada 
Carriles’ links with the material authors of the 
bombings.  There are two individuals in prison in 
Cuba who gave information to the prosecutor and 
there are documents from forensic specialists 
that show the kinds of bombs used by these 
individuals to kill Fabio diCelmo, an Italian, and injure eleven people.

Moreover, Posada Carriles boasted in an interview 
with the New York Times of being the intellectual author.

The curious thing is that, let’s suppose that he 
goes to trial and it is proven that he committed 
perjury when he denied knowing the material 
author René Cruz León, from the bombing that 
killed Fabio diCelmo, let’s go ahead and suppose 
that.  If that happens, the next question is, why 
is he not being tried for the murder of Fabio 
diCelmo, through the terrorism that was committed 
using funds that came from Miami and New York to 
carry out the conspiracy to commit cold-blooded murder against people in Cuba?

Posada Carriles has said that he lied because the 
CIA taught him exactly how to lie, and that he 
was confused when he was interviewed in El Paso?

Yes, that’s what it says in the documents that 
Posada’s attorney presented in federal court; 
that he really ought not to be tried as a liar 
because the Americans themselves taught him to 
lie when the CIA trained him.  It’s a very 
curious argument ? I don ?t believe it’ll succeed, but it’s very interesting.

It’s notable that the United States is fighting a 
war on two fronts worldwide, in its supposed 
struggle against terrorism, however, Posada 
Carriles is free in the streets of Miami.  How can this be understood?

They are at a crossroads, feeling that if he’s 
extradited, he’ll sing, so they want to protect 
him, but this is extremely damaging, because it 
exposes the double standard of U.S. policy in this struggle against terrorism.

You can’t have a terrorist the likes of Luis 
Posada Carriles protected in U.S. territory and 
stand before the United Nations and say that 
you’re the great defender of liberty and that you 
oppose terrorism.  You’re violating a mountain of 
international agreements, including U.N. Security 
Council Resolution 1373, approved at the urging 
of the U.S. government shortly after 9/11, which 
says that no U.N. member nation may protect a terrorist in its territory.

Yet while the United States continues to delay 
the case of Luis Posada Carriles, five Cuban 
anti-terrorist fighters remain incarcerated in 
U.S. prisons.  How can this be understood?

The double moral standard of the United States is 
a distortion of reality and justice.  Five 
individuals sent by Cuba to Miami to fight 
terrorism.  Their raison d’etre was to fight 
against terrorists such as Posada Carriles, 
because they went to defend Cuba from the 
terrorism that Posada Carriles was causing in Havana.

It was the 1990’s; bombs were going off at the 
Tropicana, at the Hotel Melía, at the Hotel 
Nacional, at the Bodeguita del Medio, and all of 
it was organized by Posada Carriles.

The Cubans penetrated the terrorist organizations 
in Miami that were financing that campaign, Cuba 
handed the evidence of their participation to the 
FBI and the FBI, instead of arresting the 
terrorists, arrested the individuals who 
penetrated the organization in order to collect 
the evidence, and they are still imprisoned.

They have been incarcerated for more than twelve 
years in the United States and Posada Carriles, 
who is the Osama Bin Laden of Latin America, 
remains unleashed and unvaccinated on the streets of Miami.

Just a couple of months ago we saw Posada 
Carriles in the streets of Miami at a 
demonstration in favor of the so-called Cuban 
Ladies in White.  What links exist between Posada 
and this group of people in Cuba?

There’s a strong link between the Ladies in White 
and Posada Carriles.  That link is a man called 
Santiago Álvarez Fernández Magriña, who is the 
financial godfather of Posada Carriles.

This is the individual who has always paid 
Posada’s expenses and even went to pick him up in 
Mexico in 2005 with his yacht, the Santrina, in 
order to bring him illegally into the United States.

This same Santiago Álvarez has sent money to the 
Ladies in White, through the U.S. diplomatic 
pouch and the head of the U.S. Interests Section 
in Cuba; it is on film and has been publicly 
presented ? I’m not saying anything new ? it’s 
well known.?  What happens is that we often 
suffer from historical amnesia and forget things 
that happened just last week; but this came out 
recently on television, internationally, so I’m 
not surprised when Posada Carriles comes out on 
the streets of Miami in favor of the Ladies in White.

What’s worrisome is that this kind of terrorist 
is able to participate freely in political 
actions.  Can you imagine the scandal if Osama 
Bin Laden were to come out to the streets of 
Pakistan, marching in favor of so and so’s 
widow?  The United States would be capable of 
launching an atomic bomb, but in Miami such a thing happens with impunity.

Representatives of the U.S. National Lawyers 
Guild have denounced that the government even 
went so far as to pay journalists to create this 
adverse climate against the Cuban Five in Miami.

I don’t think they’d have to pay journalists in 
Miami to disparage Cuba, I think that in Miami 
that’s like breathing, the atmosphere in Miami is 
soaked with prejudice against Cuba, it’s 
impossible to hold a fair and objective trial in Miami.

That’s why the most glaring error committed by 
the judge in the case of the Five was to refuse 
to change the venue for the case.  If I had been 
aired in another part of the United States, 
there’s no way these five would have been found 
guilty.  None of them had classified documents, 
none of them tried to penetrate any U.S. 
government agency, totally to the contrary ? they 
were penetrating Cuban American terrorrist 
organizations in Miami.  And only in Miami is it 
possible that a jury, called by the court, could 
unanimously condemn these individuals.  It’s a 
huge injustice.  I don’t believe any journalist needed to be paid.

This June 14th, a Habeas Corpus petition was 
presented on behalf of Gerardo Hernández, one of 
the five Cubans who is imprisoned in the United 
States.  What are the prospects for an initiative 
like this in the U.S. justice system?

It’s the last legal recourse remaining to 
Gerardo, who was sentenced to two life sentences 
plus 15 years.  The Supreme Court refused to hear 
his case.  Habeas Corpus is the only recourse 
that remains.  There’s a huge injustice in his 
case, which was not changing the venue for the 
trial and the errors committed by the prosecutor 
in which the jury was prejudiced against Gerardo.

It’s possible, although very difficult.  I 
believe that the solution, not just for Gerardo 
but for the Five in general, is a political 
solution.  I think Gerardo himself has said so, 
that the millions of citizens who are indignant 
about what has happened with them are the ones 
who have the keys to the jail cell in their 
hands, in order to make the President of the 
United States extend executive clemency, reducing 
these excessive sentences and setting them free.

Obama doesn’t even have to pardon them, all he 
has to do is reduce their sentences and they can 
go free just like the Puerto Rican independence 
fighters Lolita Lebron, Cancel Miranda, who were 
freed by President Jimmy Carter after their 
sentences were reduced.  Carter did this for his 
own reasons, that were followed by reciprocal 
gestures afterwards.  The same could happen here.

There are also people imprisoned in Cuba in which 
the United States might be interested. I’m sure, 
if the U.S. Government were to make a 
humanitarian gesture toward the Five, Cuba would 
do the same with people imprisoned in Cuba; Raúl Castro himself has said so.

This is a reference to the supposed contractor 
who went to Cuba with the express strategy of subverting order on the island?

He is one of the prisoners in Cuba, it should be 
mentioned that this gentleman is in prison for 
participating in a program whose purpose is 
subversion in Cuba, and the United States has 
expressed interest in his liberation.

Hopefully, he won’t spend a lot of time 
imprisoned in Cuba and Cuba will release him, but 
hopefully President Obama will release the 
Five.  Do you understand me?  There ought to be some reciprocity.

I’m sure that Mr. Alan Gross has family in the 
United States who miss him and want to be with 
him, just like Gerardo has his wife Adriana, who 
he hasn’t seen in twelve years and who wants Gerardo to return.

I believe we have to get beyond the Cold War.  I 
believe that we have to arrive at a moment where 
we might have prisoners in our prisons who might 
be considered political prisoners by both 
governments, that this should be past history.

Beyond desires to overcome the Cold War, it’s an 
undeniable fact that just a few days ago the U.S. 
Government released millions of dollars to undermine order in Cuba.

It surprised me that they’d liberated that amount 
of money while the contractor (Gross) remains a 
prisoner, because I asked myself, “How can they 
ask for the liberation of this gentleman if they 
are continuing with their program to send even 
more contractors?”  I don’t understand it but 
that’s something that President Obama has to evaluate.

President Obama has to understand that you don’t 
get to the White House to be something, but to do 
something, and if not, why did he want to be 
President of the United States?  Until now he’s 
shown himself to be very interested in making 
deals with the extreme rightwing, rather than 
confronting them and doing the right thing, in 
pursuing a different policy toward Latin America.

What he did in Honduras was very disappointing, 
but he still has time left in his presidency to 
change things, he still has time to eliminate the 
blockade, to free the Five, to extradite 
Posada.  If the extreme rightwing doesn’t like 
it, too bad, but Obama’s the president, not the extreme rightwing.

Sometimes I ask myself if Obama had been 
president during the era of Abraham Lincoln, 
would he have had the courage to go to war with 
the southern states, or would he have reached 
some kind of negotiated agreement with them?

Machetera is a member of 
<http://www.tlaxcala.es/>Tlaxcala, the 
international network of translators for 
linguistic diversity. This translation may be 
reprinted as long as the content remains 
unaltered, and the author, source and translator are cited.



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