MIAMI– Former Cuban President Raúl Castro faces new charges in Florida related to the 1996 downing of civilian planes flown by Miami-based exiles, after the U.S. government indicted the former leader earlier this year.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Monday accused Castro, 95, of ordering spies to infiltrate the exile group Brothers to the Rescue and ordering the attack on their planes. The charge of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder is based largely on a federal indictment announced in May that included charges of murder and destroying an airplane.
It remains unclear whether Castro will ever set foot in an American courtroom. Uthmeier said the arrest warrant would restrict Castro’s ability to leave the island nation and prevent him from traveling to any location with an extradition agreement with the United States.
“I am aware that Raúl Castro is an older man who probably has no intention of moving to Miami,” Uthmeier said. “I think others would do it in court, but ultimately we are prepared to pursue the case.”
According to the state’s complaint, Castro was minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces and first vice president of Cuba when he gave the final authorization to shoot down the planes. Cuban Intelligence Directorate agents operating as part of the Wasp network in the Miami and Florida Keys area infiltrated Brothers to the Rescue and reported robbery plans, the investigator said.
On February 24, 1996, three unarmed Cessna planes took off from Opa-Locka Airport in Miami-Dade County. Well outside Cuban territorial waters, Cuban MiGs destroyed two of the civilian planes with air-to-air missiles, killing all four occupants, the complaint states. The two planes were heading away from Cuba and received no alert despite contact with air traffic control in Havana, US officials said.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel called the federal indictment issued earlier this year a political coup aimed solely at “justifying the madness of military aggression against Cuba.” He accused the United States of lying and manipulating events surrounding the shooting.
“Our landmark federal indictment laid the groundwork, and James and his team have now taken an important step in bringing charges under Florida law,” U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Jason Reding Quiñones said at a news conference.
Castro succeeded his ailing older brother Fidel Castro as president in 2006 before handing power to a trusted loyalist, Díaz-Canel, in 2018.
Although he retired in 2021 as head of the Cuban Communist Party, it is widely believed that he wields power behind the scenes, as highlighted by the importance of his grandson, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro.
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump has been threatening military action in Cuba since US forces captured former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the longtime boss of the Cuban government.
After ousting the Venezuelan leader earlier this year, the White House ordered a blockade that blocked fuel shipments to Cuba, leading to severe power outages, food shortages and an economic collapse across the island.
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