Chronicle on Cuba - March 2004

Terrorism

March 1: The suspected coordinator of the September 11 attacks on the United States, Ramzi Binalshibh, is being held at the United States military prison, Guantanamo Bay, in Cuba, and is talking with interrogators. Binalshibh acknowledged meeting the lead suicide pilot of the hijacked commercial jetliners that demolished the World Trade Centre twin towers, Mohamed Atta of Egypt, in July 2001. (News24, 1/3/04)

March 1: The United States has turned over seven Russian citizens who were being held at the US detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. Sergei Fridinsky, the deputy chief prosecutor, said that Russian authorities had charged the men with illegally crossing borders, mercenary activity and participating in a criminal group, according to the Interfax news agency. They were captured in Afghanistan and accused of fighting alongside the Taliban. The seven detainees were turned over under an agreement reached between Washington and Moscow. (AP, Reuters, 1/3/04)

March 9: Five British men detained by the US military in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for more than two years have left for home, the Pentagon said. N avy Lt. Cmdr. Barbara Burfeind, a Pentagon spokeswoman, told the press the five left Cuba under guard on a British aircraft. In a statement, the Pentagon said it had transferred the five men to the British government. (CNN, 9/3/04)

March 11: Cuban oppositionist Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas sent a letter to the president of the Spanish Government, José María Aznar, expressing his solidarity with the Spanish people and condemning the genocide committed by terrorists in Madrid. In the letter, Payá says to feel the same anguish and indignation that Spanish families feel, with whom he shares the same pain. The promoter of the Varela Project added that the crime is against life itself, against every Spanish citizen, is a crime against all those who love the Spanish people, a crime against humanity. (Puente Informativo, 11/3/04)

March 11: Fidel Castro has expressed consternation and sadness at the terrorist bombing attack in the railroad system of Madrid that has so far claimed the lives of some 190 people and has resulted in over 1,200 wounded. In a letter of condolence to Spanish King Don Juan Carlos I, Castro wrote, "I can assure you that Cuba, which for 45 years has been a victim of acts of terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, understands and shares the pain brought by this revolting and unjustifiable aggression against the Spanish people." [Mensaje de Condolencia ] (Radio Habana Cuba, 11/3/04)

March 11: Cuban vice president José Ramón Fernández personally called Manuel Fraga, president of the Galicia Xunta, to express his condolence for the victims of the terrorist attack in Madrid. Cuban Foreign Affairs Minister, Felipe Pérez Roque, also communicated his condolence to Mr. Fraga. Apparently, no Cuban government official got in contact with Spanish president José María Aznar. (Europa Press, 11/3/04)

March 11: After the terrorist attack in the railroad system of Madrid, Cuban ambassador to Spain, Isabel Allende, personally expressed her condolence to the Spanish Foreign Affairs Minister. (Europa Press, 11/3/04)

March 11: Relatives of the victims of several terrorist attacks accused seven Cuban dissidents arrested in Panama on charges of plotting to kill Fidel Castro of also murdering their loved ones, and they demanded "that justice be done." Cuban citizens Luis Posada Carriles, Pedro Remón, Gaspar Jiménez Escobedo, Guillermo Novo Sampoll, Pedro Remén Rodríguez and César Matamoros, and Panamanian national Jose Manuel Hurtado, were arrested in November 2000 in Panama and charged with planning to assassinate Fidel Castro during a Latin American summit. During a news conference, Felix Victor Negrin, Lissette Diaz, Domingo Garcia, Juan Carlos Cremata and Justino Di Celmo accused the seven anti-Castro activists of killing their relatives in separate terrorist attacks against the communist regime. “We have faith and trust in the Panamanian justice system," said Negrin, whose exiled brother Eulalio Jose Negrin was killed during a terrorist attack in Union City, New Jersey, in 1979. Cremata, for his part, recalled that his father, Carlos A. Cremata, was among the 73 people who died in the explosion of a Cuban plane over Barbados in 1976, which he said, was "an absolutely terrorist act." (EFE, 11/3/04)

March 12: Two of the British men freed from Guantanamo Bay have accused their American captors of inhuman treatment, which included being beaten and interrogated at gunpoint. Prisoners were shackled for up to 15 hours at a time in hand and leg cuffs with links that cut into the skin. They were kept in wire cages that were open to the elements, as well as rats, snakes and scorpions. Psychological torture included being denied water before prayers, meaning Muslims could not wash according to their religion, and depriving one inmate of food, while the others on a block ate. Force feeding was used to end a hunger strike by 70 per cent of the 600 inmates, which started after a guard kicked a copy of the Koran. When carrying out an amputation, US medical staff often removed more of a limb than was necessary. Prisoners were left malnourished by a diet of porridge and fruit. Some food was 10 years out of date. In addition to the beatings, the abuse at the camp included US soldiers bringing in prostitutes and parading them naked in front of devout Muslims. (Independent.UK.Com, 12/3/04)

March 13: Fidel Castro said that "no act of terrorism is justified, no matter who does it," referring to last week's terrorist attacks in Madrid that killed 200 people. "No act of terrorism is justified, no matter who does it, but for reasons of a strictly political nature, it is in the interests of some and not others because everyone knows that more than 90 percent of the Spanish people opposed that war in Iraq," he said. The only way to fight terrorism, according to Castro, is "to seek sincere cooperation" because war "is not going to put an end to it, it is going to make it worse and worse, it is going to sow ever more hatred, more dissatisfaction, more tragedy." (EFE, 14/3/04)

March 15: The Pentagon has released 23 Afghans and 3 Pakistani prisoners being held at the US military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The prisoners will be flown back home, but the terms of their release were not immediately clear. (CNN, 15/3/04)

March 15: Five anti-communist Cuban exiles and a Panamanian expressed pleas of not guilty in a Panama City court at the beginning of their long-delayed trial on charges of plotting to assassinate Fidel Castro in late 2000. Luis Posada Carriles - the most prominent defendant - was the first to plead not guilty before Judge Jose Hoo Justiniani. The trial proceeded with the reading of the indictment, which cited "serious signs" that link Posada Carriles and the five others to the alleged attempt on the Cuban leader's life. (EFE, 15/3/04)

March 16: Cuba denounced the presence of a Cuban-American it considers a "terrorist" as an official member of the US delegation to the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva and demanded that his accreditation be withdrawn immediately. Luiz Zuñiga Rey, a Miami resident, is the "former president of the paramilitary arm of the Cuban American National Foundation." Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque said the man's name appears on an official report from the Human Rights Commission dated December 21, 1999. (EFE, 16/3/04)

March 16: Prosecutors said four Cuban exiles accused of possessing explosives in an alleged plot to kill Fidel Castro planned to kill Cuba's leader in cold-blood. "There shouldn't be clemency for these people," said federal attorney Arquimedes Saez. After being delayed three times, the trial got under way with the reading of statements from the accused, all of whom declared their innocence. Luis Posada Carriles, Gaspar Jimenez Escobedo, Guillermo Novo, and Pedro Remon have been charged with conspiracy, possessing explosives and endangering the public's safety. An explosives conviction carries a maximum penalty of seven years in prison, while the lesser charges carry sentences of one to three and two to five years behind bars, respectively. Also charged in the case are two Panamanians, Cesar Matamoros and Posada Carriles' driver, Jose Hurtado. (AP, 16/3/04)

March 20: The special rapporteur of the UN Human Rights Commission, Enrique Bernales Ballesteros, said that the accusations of the Cuban delegation in the Human Rights Commission about the participation of Luis Zúñiga Rey as a member of the US delegation is based on a report Ballesteros had presented in 1999. In the report, Ballesteros denounced Zúñigas’criminal record. “There is urgent need for international laws to define these crimes”, Ballesteros stressed. (Prensa Latina, 20/3/04)

March 27: Cuba denounced the presence of whom it considers a terrorist, Luis Zúñiga Rey, as member of the US delegation to the 60th Commission of Human Rights (CDH) in Geneva. Cuban UN ambassador, Orlando Requeijo Gual, addressed a letter to the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, in which he states "that it is a true insult and a total lack of respect under the guise of a diplomat and member of a delegation" of a person "of such a widespread and well known criminal record". The letter referred that the accusation was backed by the report of the Special Rapporteur on Mercenaries, Enrique Bernales Ballesteros, which was presented to the HRC in 1999. (Prensa Latina, 27/3/04)

March 30: Repeating and strengthening previous allegations about Cuba's alleged weapons of mass destruction program, a Bush administration official told Congress in written testimony that the island "remains a terrorist and [biological weapons] threat to the United States." "I believe the case for the existence of a developmental Cuba [biological weapons research and development] effort is strong," said John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security. Bolton made the allegations as part of a 25-page written statement on the development and spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. Bolton also said Cuba has been successful at hiding details of its weapons program thanks to data passed to Havana by convicted spy Ana Belen Montes, the former senior Cuba analyst for the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency. Montes is serving 25 years in federal prison after pleading guilty in 2002 of spying for Cuba. (Sun Sentinel, 31/3/04)

March 31: Cuba rejected a renewed accusation by a senior US official that it is developing biological weapons and said the charges were an attempt to seek a pretext to invade the communist-run island. Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque called a news conference to deny the latest charge by John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security in the Bush administration, who made a similar accusation in 2002. [Press Conference by the Cuban Foreign Affairs Minister] (Reuters, 31/3/04)