Luis Posada Carriles

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Luis Posada Carriles (born February 15, 1928) is an anti-Castro and anti-Communist fugitive who is known to have been involved in numerous violent terrorist plots, including Operation 40, hotel bombings and the 1976 bombing of a Cubana Flight 455 in which seventy-three people were killed. He is also known to have been involved in Operation Condor, namely in Orlando Letelier's murder in Washington, D.C., a few weeks before Cubana de Aviación's explosion. Posada has lived in Venezuela, where he became a naturalized citizen and served in its political police; and the United States, where he served in the U.S. Army and developed a relationship with the CIA.

In April 2005, Posada sought political asylum in the United States. Venezuela, where he had broken out of prison, has formally requested Posada's extradition,^{[#endnote_CNN]} as has Cuba ^{[#endnote_BBC]}. A Department of Homeland Security judge ruled that he cannot be deported because of alleged threat of torture in Venezuela [link]. According to Cuba's official newspaper on March 22, 2006, the US Immigration and Custorms Enforcement (ICE) informed Posada that he would continue to be detained on the grounds that he continues "to present a danger to the community and a flight risk" and claimed that he has "a history of engaging in criminal activity, associating with individuals involved in criminal activity, and participating in violent acts that indicate a disregard for the safety of the general public".[link] With Guillermo Novo Sampoll, Orlando Bosch and Gaspar Jiménez Escobedo, he founded the Coordination of United Revolutionary Organizations (CORU)[link].

Contents

1 Seeking asylum in U.S.
2 Personal life
3 References
4 External links

4.1 Articles and reports
4.2 Spanish language websites

5 Further reading

5.1 Articles
5.2 Books

Seeking asylum in U.S.

The New York Times reported[link] on April 27, 2006 that Posada has applied to become a United States citizen. On April 13, 2005, Posada requested political asylum in the United States through his attorney. He is being held on accusations he entered the country illegally across the Mexican border. On May 3, the Venezuelan Supreme Court approved an extradition request for him. Speaking the same day in Washington, D.C., State Department Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs Roger Noriega stated that Posada might not have been in the United States. Noriega added that charges against him "may be a completely manufactured issue." However declassified FBI and CIA reports show that the agencies suspected his involvement in the airline bombing within days of its occurrence.

On May 17, 2005 the Miami Herald conducted an interview with Posada in South Florida; later that day, the Herald and the Associated Press reported that he had been detained by the Department of Homeland Security. He had withdrawn his asylum appeal and was moving to sneak out of the country when arrested. His arrest presents diplomatic problems as his extradition is sought by both Cuba and Venezuela, neither of which are close U.S. allies. His arrest coincided with large anti-Carriles protests in Havana - organizers estimated that hundreds of thousands of Cubans participated in the rally. At this time, Carriles is being held by U.S. immigration authorities in El Paso, Texas, on charges of entering the country illegally — Posada's immigration case had a hearing before a Homeland Security judge in Texas on August 29, 2005, had another on September 26 [link] . On September 28th a US judge ruled that Posada cannot be deported because he 'faced the threat of torture in Venezuela'. The Venezuelan government reacted angrily to the ruling, accusing the US of having a "double standard in its so-called war on terrorism". [link]

The Venezuelan Government wants to retry Carriles for his role in the 1976 airline bombing. The Cuban government wants to try him for the hotel bombings, but has agreed that extraditing him to Venezuela would be acceptable, not least because Venezuela has had an extradition treaty with the US since 1922, but Cuba does not. The United States denied Venezuela's extradition request, citing a lack of evidence. Some have questioned this decision since then as clear evidence of a double standard policy by the United States. Moreover, Cuba has suspicions that Posada's actions were backed and organized by the CIA [link].

At the XIVth Ibero-American Summit in Salamanca, in October 2005, the final declaration includes a demand to "extradite or judge the responsible of the terrorist blowing-up of a plane of the Cubana-aviation in October 1976, which caused the death of 73 innocents civilians" [link].

Personal life

According to declassified FBI documents, Posada has been married at least twice and has a son, Jorge.

When Posada appeared in court in July, 2005, he had bandages from an operation for facial skin cancer. Now 77, he is reported (September, 2005) to be ailing.

References

↑ http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4571957.stm
↑ http://www.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/americas/11/21/cuba.publicenemy.ap/
↑ The National Security Archive, a non-governmental organization, has a [large collection] of declassified United States government documents regarding Posada's relationship with the United States. [This 1965 FBI memo] gives an overview of Posada and his early life.
↑ [This 1966 FBI document] is one among many in the collection to describe Posada's relationship with the United States, stating that Posada at that time received $300/month from the CIA, and was being considered to head a military alliance against Fidel Castro and the Cuban government.
↑ The list of ammunitions surrendered to U.S. customs in the [FBI document], also released by the National Security Archive, extends across a four-page document.
↑ From http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB153/19650707.pdf
↑ From http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB157/19761014.pdf
↑ Allegations against Posada grow, Miami Herald, May 22, 2005. Accessed from http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/11707572.htm on June 6, 2005.
↑ The New York Times ran a long series of articles on Posada, described below. Facts here were drawn from A Mastermind Reveals Some Key Secrets.

External links

[Luis Posada Carriles: The Declassified Record. CIA and FBI Documents Detail Career in International Terrorism; Connection to U.S.] National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 153. [National Security Archive] at George Washington University. Retrieved May 11, 2005.
Posada Carriles, Luis. [Los Caminos del Guerrero]. Spanish-language autobiography. August 1994. Retrieved May 12, 2005
[Luis Posada Carriles photo and article archive] held by [Latino Studies Resources] at Indiana University, Bloomington. Retrieved May 20, 2005.

Articles and reports

[How authentic journalists caught an international terrorist in Mexico], from the original version in [Spanish], published in [NarcoNews] and also in the very same [¡Por Esto!] ([here]). Published June 21, 2005.
[Miami Herald articles on Luis Posada Carriles]. Accessed April 13, 2005.
[Keeping things in perspective: Cuba and the question of international terrorism] By Anya K. Landau and Wayne S. Smith. November 6, 2001. [Center for International Policy]. Accessed April 13, 2005.
[Terrorist Cuban Exile Luis Posada Carriles Seeking Political Asylum in U.S.]. Print friendly [Transcript] Segment available in [Streaming Real Audio] and [128k Real Video]. Guest: Ann Louise Bardach. Interviewer: Amy Goodman. Democracy Now!. Monday, May 9th, 2005. Retrieved May 12, 2005.
[Hypocrisy on Terrorism: The Case of Luis Posada] By Jeff Cohen, published in Los Angeles Times in September 1989, reproduced in the Spanish-English language website [Antiterroristas], also reproduced [here] (with added links) by [Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting].
[Biography of Luis Posada Carriles]. Accessed November 14, 2005.
["U.S. will harbor 'Osama Bin Laden of Latin America'"], The Free Press, October, 2005
[Posada Carriles, Orlando Bosch and the Downing of Cubana Flight 455: A Glimpse into the Mind of a Terrorist], Counterpunch, April 11, 2006. By Jose Pertierra, an attorney, practicing in Washington, D.C. He represents the Venezuelan government in the case of Luis Posada Carriles.

Spanish language websites

[La presencia de Posada Carriles en EE.UU. es el epítome de la doble moral]. Cubadebate.org. 02 de marzo de 2006. Retrieved March 3, 2006.
[El C-4, la Operación Cóndor, los Bush y Posada Carriles]. Rebelión.org. 03 de junio de 2005. Retrieved June 22, 2005.
[Posada Carriles se queda en Panamá]. BBC Mundo. Martes, 17 de abril de 2001 - 23:25 GMT. Retrieved April 14, 2005.
[Terroristas En El Banquillo De Los Acusados]. Radio Reloj, Cuba. September 2003. Retrieved April 14, 2005.
[Anticastrista desaparecido en Honduras]. EFE . Univision. 31 de Agosto de 2004. Retrieved April 14, 2005.
http://www.esotopa.com/posada.htm "Nota de prensa 13 de abril del 2005 Law Office of Eduardo Soto PA"
[José Pertierra, representante legal del gobierno de Venezuela: Luis Posada Carriles está frito] Entrevista publicada originalmente en [Ultimas Noticias], Venezuela, el 7 de mayo del 2006. José Pertierra is a lawyer representing the government of Venezuela in the extradition case of Luis Posada Carriles. His office is in Washington, D.C.