5-30-05, 8:50am
The Cuban chapter of the network of “In Defense of Humanity” networks calls on intellectuals, artists, union leaders, social activists, members of parliament and political leaders from our continent and other parts of the world to participate in the international conference “Against terrorism, for truth and justice”, to be held in the Havana Convention Centre from 2 to 3 June 2005.
In recent weeks, we have been outraged at how the government of the United States, self-proclaimed leader of the worldwide war on terrorism, protects the authors of monstrous crimes by virtue of its political alliance with Miami’s far-right sectors and its proven complicity in those crimes.
For months, US authorities ignored and even doubted the presence, in South Florida, of the renowned murderer Luis Posada Carriles, the confessed perpetrator of a chain of terrorist acts involving the placing of bombs in numerous Cuban hotels, a fugitive from Venezuelan justice and one of the men responsible, among other atrocities, for the blowing up of a civilian plane which claimed the lives of 73 people. During that time, this criminal enjoyed complete impunity, had access to the press and to his powerful friends in the US government. Only after Cuba’s repeated denunciation of this blatant double-standard and its media repercussions did immigration and customs federal services simulate an arrest which only extends this farce. As a result of this, the western hemisphere’s worst terrorist has been ridiculously and minimally accused of illegal entry into US territory. Numerous documents declassified by federal agencies, including the CIA, the FBI and the State Department, unquestionably demonstrate that Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch, who freely walks the streets of Miami today, were responsible for sabotaging the Cubana flight in 1976 and that US authorities had prior knowledge of the crime.
Bosch and this group of Cuban-born terrorists were implicated in the murders of Chilean Minister of Foreign Affairs Orlando Letelier, his assistant, the American Ronnie Moffit, Chilean General Carlos Prats and his wife Sofia Cuthbert (all perpetrated at the service of the CIA and Pinochet’s DINA), and participated directly in the planning and execution of the sinister acts of torture, disappearances and murders of the so-called Plan Condor, in coordination with the CIA and security services of the Southern Cone military dictatorships.
Nearly thirty years later, the government which, in the name of its “war on terrorism”, is responsible for a veritable genocide in Iraq, questions the legitimacy of a request to extradite an international criminal, submitted by Venezuelan authorities and backed by that country’s parliament and supreme court. Over twenty US congress- people have backed the extradition request, while these facts receive more and more coverage in the US press. These murderers must be tried and convicted. The peoples of Latin America do not want vengeance, they demand justice. There is no justification for this double- standard nor any legal argument to turn down the request to extradite a renowned criminal and try his accomplices, trained by US special services, paid by the CIA for many years and protected by the White House, which will guarantee Bosch’s peaceful stay in Miami and today blocks Posada Carriles’ extradition.
In the name of the most elemental decency, the innocent victims of these terrorists and the right to truth, we demand that the US government immediately extradite Posada Carriles to Venezuela and try Orlando Bosch in Chile. We call on all men and women who love peace, freedom and justice to join in this demand.
“Humanity longs for justice”
GRANMA INTERNATIONAL/ONLINE EDITION
