US indicts former Cuban president Raúl Castro as it seeks to oust regime | Raúl Castro

The United States on Wednesday issued a federal criminal complaint against Cuba’s former president Raúl Castro and five others, significantly escalating the Trump administration’s campaign to topple the country’s six-decade communist regime.

The 94-year-old political figure was charged in Miami, Florida, with conspiracy to kill US citizens, four counts of murder and two counts of destroying an aircraft.

The other defendants are a fighter pilot who was first charged in the 1996 incident in which four people were killed by the Cuban military when their plane was shot down during a humanitarian mission in the Strait of Florida.

It is alleged that Castro, who was Cuba’s defense minister at the time, gave the order to open fire.

indictmentThe case, heard in the US district court for the southern district of Florida, came at a time when tensions were increasing between the US and Cuba. Donald Trump has threatened military action against the Cuban government, and the energy crisis created by a strict US oil embargo has caused rolling blackouts and led to protests in the capital.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday afternoon after the indictment was announced, Trump said “tensions will not escalate” regarding Cuba.

“I don’t think it should happen,” he said. “Look, this place is falling apart. They’ve really lost control of Cuba.”

Asked if there would be an arrest similar to that of ousted Venezuelan President Nicholás Maduro earlier this year, he said: “I don’t want to say that.”

Miami’s Freedom Tower, where more than half a million Cuban refugees were treated as immigrants between 1962 and 1974 after fleeing Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution, provided a symbolic backdrop for the indictment. Announcement made on Cuban national day.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said: “For the first time in nearly 70 years, senior leaders of the Cuban regime are being charged for acts of violence that resulted in the deaths of American citizens in this country.

“Nations and their leaders cannot be allowed to target Americans, kill them, and face accountability.”

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel condemned the indictment as a political stunt that merely sought to “justify the stupidity of the military attack on Cuba.” In a message on social media, he accused the United States of lying and manipulating events surrounding the attack, including ignoring repeated warnings by Cuban officials that they would defend against “dangerous violations” of their airspace by “notorious terrorists.”

Raúl Castro allegedly authorized the shooting down of two small planes belonging to the Miami-based Brothers Rescue Volunteer exile group on February 24, 1996; this plane would comb 90 miles of water between Cuba and the Florida Keys for refugees.

Four men, Armando Alejandre Jr, Carlos Costa, Mario de la Peña and Pablo Morales, lost their lives when their Cessna was hit by missiles fired from MiG fighter jets belonging to the Cuban air force.

A third plane, flown by the group’s founder José Basulto, escaped and landed safely in Florida.

Raúl Castro left the presidency in 2018 and resigned as secretary of Cuba’s communist party three years later, but remains one of the most powerful figures in Cuban politics. Fidel Castro passed away in 2016 at the age of 90.

It is unclear whether he will appear in a US court to answer the charges. “We expect him to come here voluntarily or otherwise,” Blanche said, an apparent allusion to the capture and extradition of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro by US military forces in January.

“We expect and believe that Mr. Castro will have the right to stand trial here in Miami.”

Also on Wednesday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio published a message to the Cuban people via X. He said in Spanish: “The reason you have to survive without electricity is not because of America’s oil embargo.

“There is no electricity, fuel or food because the people who control it have looted billions of dollars but nothing has been used to help people.”

Carlos Cossio, Cuba’s deputy foreign minister, responded in his post about X.

“It is not ignorance or incompetence that makes the US Secretary of State lie so repeatedly and unconscionably when talking about Cuba and trying to justify aggression against the Cuban people,” he wrote.

“He knows very well that there is no excuse for such cruel and ruthless aggression.”

Earlier in Washington, D.C., a group of members of the Cuban American Congress held a press conference to welcome the indictment. The indictment was returned by a Miami grand jury on April 23, Blanche said.

“Today is a great day for Cubans who were forced to involuntarily leave their homeland, which we represent in the city of Miami, because of the cruelty of the evil of a group of gangsters, the Castro family, who did nothing but take over the island,” said Maria Elvira Salazar, representing South Florida.

Republican Florida congressman Carlos Giménez told reporters that Brothers Rescue volunteers were trying to save lives when they were attacked.

“They were looking for these beams in the middle of the Florida Strait to avoid getting killed, then they reported it to the Coast Guard, and that’s all they did,” he said.

“They weren’t carrying drugs, they weren’t doing anything illegal, they were in international waters and they were American citizens.

“For too long this has continued without any repercussions for any human being, or at least for the person most responsible for this act, Raúl Castro.

“I don’t know why it took 30 years, but the number one duty of every government is to protect its citizens. Finally, this administration, the Trump administration, realized this and said, ‘Yes, we will protect American citizens.’ And yes, justice may come a little late in this case, but justice will be served.”

Salazar said he hopes Cubans on the island will continue to respond to U.S. pressure and Castro’s accusations by protesting their government.

“The message is to the Castro family: Understand this carefully, your days are over,” he said.

“A federal indictment is serious business. Maduro thought Trump was being stupid… and look where Maduro is today, in a federal prison in New York.”

“So we are sending this message to the Castro family, it is time for you to leave. It is time for you to heed the signal from the White House and not fall into the abyss.”

“You have the choice not to go where Maduro is. You can leave here now and leave the island in the hands of opposition forces and freedom, so that fate can bring Cuba to a different place.”

Associated Press contributed reporting