Well, here’s some expected-unexpected welcome news. Just as I finished reading a book today on the case of the Cuban Five, guess who finally kicked the bucket? Yup…THIS guy:
Luis Posada Carriles, the terrorist of Cuban origins, died today in the US state of Florida, where he was living free in spite of continued denunciations of his criminal activities and calls for extradition against him.
Attorney Arturo Hernández confirmed that the dead of the 90-year-old occurred around 5 a.m. on Wednesday, in a US government home for veterans located in Miramar, in southern Florida.
In his history, there are several terrorist actions on the Caribbean island and other Latin American countries, and attempts on the life of the Cuban revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro.
A 1976 document declassified by the US State Department pointed to Posada Carriles as the most likely author of the terrorist act that upset the people of Cuba and other nations of the region on October 6 of that year.
It dealt with the downing in mid-flight of an airliner belonging to Cubana de Aviación, which plunged into the sea off the coast of Barbados with 73 persons on board: 11 Guyanese, five Koreans, and 57 Cubans — a crime for which the deceased is considered the intellectual author.
The memorandum, sent to the then secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, indicated that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had ties to three of the persons “supposedly” implicated in the downing of the Cubana plane.
The text detailed the links between that organization and individuals linked to the sabotage, and directly cited Hernán Ricardo Lozano, Freddy Lugo, Orlando Bosch, Frank Castro, Orlando García, Ricardo Morales Navarrete, Félix Martínez Suárez, and Posada Carriles.
Archives revealed in the US late last year over the assassination of John F. Kennedy contain the secret expedient of the terrorist, who was a CIA informant but was considered so dangerous that even that agency kept him under surveillance.
According to those materials, the organization considered the plans of the confessed criminal to be terrorism, and was very worried about its relationship with him, which became public due to the sabotage of the Cubana plane.
One of the declassified documents referred to a meeting that took place in 1976 in the Dominican Republic, between Posada, Bosch and other individuals, in which they discussed “several terrorist plans”, among them “placing bombs on Cuban airplanes and diplomatic missions” on the island.
The US agency was also aware of the shipments of weapons to Guyanese insurgents in 1969, of the participation of Posada in an attempt to topple the government of Guatemala, and of his role in various assassination plots against Fidel Castro.
In 2005, he illegally entered the United States and was jailed for that, but two years later he paid bail and was freed despite international calls demanding his extradition to Venezuela, where he was a fugitive from justice.
As well, in 2011, judge Kathleen Cardone exonerated him of the migratory crime, considering him “aged and an invalid”. Since then, he remained in that land, protected by the US government.
Translation mine. Links (not in original) added.
And with that, the long and hideously storied career of one of the 20th century’s worst criminals comes to an end. And so does my CubanaBomber Death Watch category. Luis Posada Carriles, alias AMCLEVE-15, CIFENCE-4, WKSCARLET-3, Commissar Basilio, and many other pseudonyms, may you finally get your just reward…from Cthulhu.
