On 20 May, the U.S. Justice Department charged six Cuban nationals over an alleged crime from 30 years ago. At the same time the USS Nimitz strike group dropped anchor in the waters near Cuba. Is Donald Trump preparing a re-run of his abduction of Venezuela’s president earlier this year?
Washington says it wants to haul six men into a U.S. court: Raul Castro, 94, younger brother of the late Fidel Castro, and five others.
The supposed offence: the 1996 shootdown of two allegedly civilian Cessnas operated by a Miami-based exile group encouraging Cubans to leave the island. Washington says the planes were in international waters; Havana insists they had breached Cuban airspace.
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel on the gathering storm:
”This is a political manoeuvre, devoid of any legal basis, aimed solely at padding the dossier they are fabricating to justify the folly of a military aggression against Cuba.”
Both the indictment and the arrival of the Nimitz strike group, also including the destroyer USS Gridley and the oil tanker USNS Patuxent, coincided with the island nation’s Independence Day, 20 May.
The choreography is reminiscent of the US build-up to the dawn raid of 3 January, earlier this year, when U.S. special forces stormed Caracas, kidnapped President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, and hustled them to New York — where they are still in custody.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Justice: United States Unseals Superseding Indictment Charging Raul Castro and Five Castro Regime Co-Defendants for 1996 Shoot-Down of Brothers to the Rescue Aircraft
- Al Jazeera: Trump administration indicts Cuba’s Raul Castro over 1996 plane shootdown
- The Hill: USS Nimitz arrives in Caribbean amid Cuba tensions
- UK House of Commons Library: The US capture of Nicolás Maduro
