Beautiful Horizons

Justice Crawling, But Moving Nevertheless

This bit of news seems to have slipped by this weekend:

Luis Posada Carriles, 81, was charged with 11 counts of lying to US authorities over his involvement in the 1997 bombings at tourist sites in Cuba and other matters. An Italian tourist, Fabio di Celmo, was killed in the 1997 bomb blast at the Copacabana hotel in Havana. In addition, Venezuelan authorities have accused Posada of planning the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner off the coast of Barbados that killed all 73 people aboard.

Here's the gist of it:

According to the indictment, during a deportation hearing Posada falsely told an immigration judge under oath that he had not been involved in anti-Castro bombings in Cuba, and that he had not arranged for an alleged accomplice to bring explosives into Cuba. The alleged accomplice, Salvadoran national Raul Cruz Leon, was convicted in Cuba of the bombings and sentenced to death. Among other accusations, prosecutors said Posada lied about how he had entered the US, and lied about holding a false Guatemalan passport.

There's a simple solution for this: deportation. I would favor sending him to Venezuela. A man who said he has not renounced violence has no business being here.

The Spanish Factory

In October of 2007, the Spanish government passed a law called the Law of Historical Memory, designed to address the suffering of those who were victims of the Spanish Civil War, the Franco dictatorship, as well as to eliminate the last sanctioned Francoist relics from Spanish political and cultural life.

It has had an interesting side effect:

Spain issued on Thursday the first of a projected 200,000 passports for Cubans who qualify for Spanish citizenship under the country's "historical memory" law.

The first recipient, 38-year-old cardiologist Norberto Luis Diaz, said he already had his bags packed for a flight on Sunday to Spain, retracing in reverse the journey his grandfather made when he emigrated to Cuba in 1916.

"It's the most important day of my life. I am happy," he said upon receiving his purple-colored passport in the office of Spain's consul general.

The Law of Historical Memory makes grandchildren of Spanish immigrants eligible for citizenship, and Spain has estimated 1 million people around the world, including 200,000 Cubans, could apply.

Cuba was a haven for those who fled Franco's Spain. Now the reverse may very well be true. The numbers have been significant enough to lead some to call the Spanish Embassy in Havana "The Spanish Factory." What has been interesting has been the relative silence on the side of the Cuban government. Are they anticipating remittances going back to Cuba from Spain? I can't imagine that as right now Spain's unemployment is at a twelve year high and the new Spanish citizens may have a difficult time finding employment in Spain. Is it being done to facilitate travel out of Cuba possibly to the US as Spain is one of the participants in the Visa Waiver Program?

I'm guessing that Cuba wants to maintain amicable relations with Spain as Spain has taken a somewhat softer line with Cuba recently than some other EU members and as Spain has extensive tourism and other investments in Cuba.

In any event, I certainly hope that they don't go to my old hometown, Miami. It would be disappointing to say the least to see the descendants of those who fled one dictatorship, leaving another one for a community that finds the banning of disagreeable books to be acceptable.

Pent Up Demand

My dear departed friend, Kimson Plaut lived in Brazil for 12 years without getting a phone. It was a nightmare trying to get one, he told me on several occasions, so he just gave up.

A few years ago I was talking to a woman who worked for Bell South. She told me that when they opened up their first cellular franchise in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, the lines formed around the block the night before.

This, then, should surprise no one:

Lines stretched for blocks at phone stores as Cubans were allowed to sign up for cellphone service for the first time. The contracts cost about $120 to activate, a half-year’s average salary. Still, lines formed before the stores opened, and waits grew to more than an hour.

It's pent up demand, especially for something that has been denied.

Give It A Rest

This is so silly. If Castro dies today, I certainly won't mourn him, but I have enough good sense to know that Cuba doesn't become a democracy tomorrow welcoming the exile community with open arms. Calm down.

A Possible Way Out

Reading this article in Saturday's New York Times about fugitives from the US in Cuba gives me an idea about solving the impasse regarding Luis Posada: exchange him one-for-one with Cuba for Joanne Chesimard.

Clearly the US wants Chesimard and Cuba clearly wants Posada. It won't happen, however, and here's why: neither man has the political will or the strength of character to do that which might defy their own respective bases. Bush will not acknowledge that it is far better for the image of the United States not to harbor an accused terrorist and send Posada packing than it is to appeal to the hard-line "he's not a terrorist he's a freedom fighter constituency. For his part, Castro would rather use Posada's presence in the US as a cudgel to pound the US, than he would to bring Posada to justice.

On something completely irrelevant to the above, I note in this article that Posada 's favorite  hobby is oil painting. So is his comrade-in-bombs, Orlando Bosch. Talk about giving a bad name to the fine arts . . .

Moral Clarity Takes a Holiday - Again

There's really not much more to say about the truly odious decision by Judge Kathleen Cardone that has dropped all charges against an accused terrorist, Luis Posada Carriles and has made him a free man, for the moment, anyway.

There are some interesting comments to the news at the Miami Herald website here, not all of which is supportive of Posada. In fact, there are a number of them that criticize Posada and his release. I truly hope that this generation of Cuban-Americans rejects Posada and his brother-in-terrorism, Orlando Bosch.

The National Security Archives has a detailed dossier of Posada's wretched past. read it and try not to get too depressed.

Terrorist Enabling

I don't have much to add to what Richard wrote here about the release of Luis Posada, except to point to this op-ed piece by Bernardo Alvarez Herrera, Venezuela's Ambassador to the US in Saturday's New York Times.  This part illustrates why the Bush administration's position is beneath contempt:

Twenty-two months have passed since Venezuela formally asked for his extradition, offering 2,000 pages of documentary evidence to substantiate its claim, yet the State Department has not even acknowledged receiving the request.

Imagine just for a moment what the Bush administration's posture would be if the situation were reversed; if, for example, Venezuela refused to extradite Osama bin Laden or Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. One certainly needn't admire Chavez nor Castro to find this disturbing. One need only admire and respect justice, something that the Bush administration appears to hold in contempt.

While we're at it, can we send this bastard back to Haiti, too?

Interesting

I'm not entirely certain what to make of this, but I do find it interesting:

Cuba is deporting reputed drug kingpin Luis Hernando Gomez Bustamante to Colombia, which plans to extradite him to the United States, a government official told The Associated Press.

The Colombian official said Gomez was expected to arrive in Bogota on Thursday and would be held at its heavily fortified chief prosecutor's office compound before being extradited to the United States.

I know that in unofficial talks the US and Cuban governments have met to discuss issues of common concern such as drug trafficking and immigration, however, this seems different.

Bustamante had been in Cuba since 2004. Fidel Castro has handed power over to Raúl Castro. Now Bustamante is facing extradition and will likely face trial in the US. It seems hard to believe that this is coincidence.

More On Posada Carriles

Do not miss reading Peter Kornbluh's Nation article about the Bush administration's lack of moral calrity regarding Luis Posada Carriles. Here are some of the key points:

On September 11 a midlevel magistrate named Norbert Garney filed legal papers in an El Paso, Texas, court recommending that notorious Cuban-exile terrorist Luis Posada Carriles be set free. In response to a petition of habeas corpus filed by Posada's lawyers, Garney's twenty-three-page "Report and Recommendation" (R&R) concluded that the Bush Administration had failed to avail itself of basic legal procedures to keep Posada in jail. Posada "was never certified by the Attorney General as a terrorist or danger to the community" under the Patriot Act, according to the R&R, nor had the Justice Department presented evidence of "special circumstances" that would allow it to hold Posada for security or terrorism concerns. In light of those findings, the magistrate wrote, "the Court recommends that Petitioner's request for habeas relief be granted, and that [Posada] be released."

As Kornbluh notes, the Bush administration has not responded to Venezuela's request for extradition. Here's one very likely reason why:

(If the Administration denied the petition outright, it would be obligated under the 1973 Montreal Convention to put Posada on trial for that crime in the United States.)

Why would they not want to try Posada here? I'm only speculating, but I have little reason to doubt that it's because of the amount of dirt that Posada could bring out from his days working with the CIA.

For much, much more on Posada read this dossier from the National Security Archives.

I Certainly Didn't Celebrate Yesterday

Yesterday was Fidel Castro's birthday and I suppose there is no greater evidence of the cult of personality that surrounds him than the fact that the nation is "celebrating." Gee, I always thought that a revolution was about so much more than the head revolutionary . . .

As for the revolution itself, there is no better evidence as to how wretchedly it has failed than Castro's own words. Consider this op-ed by Ann Louise Bardach, the author of the single best book on the exile community and Cuba. She quoted from a collection of letters Castro wrote from prison after the failed attack on the Moncada Barracks. Here's the most revealing quote:

“The best proof that there is no dictatorship is that there are no political prisoners,” they said for many months; today prison and exile are overflowing, therefore they cannot say that we live under a democratic constitutional regime.

That is Castro writing about the Batista regime. It could have easily have been any of the dissidents he has imprisoned over the years writing that about him. How quickly and how thoroughly he became that which he rebelled against.

Marc Cooper has more.

Eric Umansky has even more - and gives a righteous smackdown some pretty lame observations by the New York Times reporter who slipped into Cuba on a tourist visa.