1-18-07, 8:59 am

The international media has reported that on January 11, 2007, the United States government, which for more than 18 months has been protecting international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, has been obliged to indict him on charges of fraud and lying when applying for U.S. citizenship.

The U.S. government has been forced to acknowledge that our Comandante en Jefe was right when he commented in April 2005 on the information published by the Mexican newspaper Por Esto, repeatedly charging that Posada Carriles had been in U.S. territory with total impunity for almost a month, having arrived aboard the Santrina boat from Islas Mujeres, where he had been picked up by Santiago Alvarez Fernández-Magriñá and other terrorists to be taken to the United States.

When the U.S. government was obliged to arrest him on May 17, 2005, after being in U.S. territory illegally for two months but left in peace, the terrorist wove a web of lies by saying he had entered U.S. territory via land, coming from the Mexican city of Matamoros; that he had not been in Cancún or on Islas Mujeres; and that during his transit through Mexico, he had never seen either the Santrina boat or the other terrorists, who — as our president exposed — accompanied him on his trip through Mexico to the United States.

In announcing the indictment on January 11, the U.S. government alleges that Posada engaged in fraudulent behavior and lied, because “in fact, he entered the United States by sea aboard the motor vessel “Santrina”; that he traveled to Cancún and Islas Mujeres; that he boarded the Santrina in Mexico “and traveled thereon  to the United States”; and that Santiago Alvarez, Osvaldo Mitat, Rubén López Castro and José Pujol were with him aboard the Santrina during “his passage aboard that motor vessel from Mexico to the United States.”

The U.S. government often forgets that the truth has always been an essential weapon of the Cuban Revolution. Now, almost two years later, it has had no choice but to acknowledge it.

For its part and in response to Cuba’s request for an in-depth investigation of Posada Carriles’ movement through that country, the Vicente Fox government in Mexico officially informed our government on May 25, 2005 that its records did not show the terrorist’s entry into Mexican territory. It also said that the Santrina boat had arrived at Islas Mujeres on March 14, 2005 and affirmed that, after refueling, the boat had left that location with the same crew as when it arrived, without Luis Posada Carriles being among them. 

In its January 11 indictment, the U.S. government makes no reference to terrorism. The U.S. government knows very well about and has all the evidence of the countless act of terrorism committed by Posada Carriles, including the mid-flight sabotage of a Cubana Aviation airliner in 1976 and the terrorist attacks on Cuban hotels in 1997, one of which killed Fabio Di Celmo, a young Italian tourist.

For the U.S. government, the only procedure in line with international treaties on terrorism to which it is party and what is established by its own legislation, would have been to describe Luis Posada Carriles from the start as a terrorist and to indict him on charges of terrorism, which would have avoided the long immigration process in El Paso, whose only objective was to protect him in order to prevent him from speaking publicly about the many secrets he knows regarding the empire’s covert and illegal actions and its links with the anti-Cuban mafia, particularly during the period in which the father of the current U.S. president was director of the CIA.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs trusts that this indictment of the terrorist Posada Carriles for minor immigration-related crimes does not become a smokescreen for giving him impunity for the serious crime of terrorism, or a pretext to continue ignoring the application for Posada Carriles’ extradition, presented on June 15, 2005 by the government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela for his responsibility in the destruction of a Cubana Aviation airliner, and which has yet to receive a response.

The next test for the government of President Bush will be on February 1. That day, it will have to respond to an order by Judge Philip Martínez to justify why Posada Carriles should remain in prison, in line with Section 412 of the U.S. Patriot Act, and to do so it will be obliged to admit that his release is a threat to U.S. security and to the security of the community and any other person.” The moment of truth has arrived. The victims’ families are demanding justice. The Cuban people accompany them in their pain and fully support them. We will now see what action will be taken by the president who named himself the “international leader of the war on terror.”

Havana, January 15, 2007

The above is a statement from the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was translated by Granma International