US announces charges for Raúl Castro in 1996 aircraft shootdown

MIAMI (AP): Federal prosecutors yesterday announced charges against former Cuban president Raúl Castro  in the 1996 downing of civilian planes operated by Miami-based exiles, as the Trump administration escalated pressure on the socialist government.

 The indictment was related to Castro’s alleged role in the shootdown of two small planes operated by the exile group Brothers to the Rescue. Castro, now 94, was Cuba’s defence minister at the time. The charges included murder and destruction of an airplane. 

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and other top Justice Department officials made the announcement in Miami at a ceremony to honour those killed in the shootdown.

“For nearly 30 years, the families of four murdered Americans have waited for justice,” Blanche said. “They were unarmed civilians and were flying humanitarian missions for the rescue and protection of people fleeing oppression across the Florida straits.”

Asked to what lengths American authorities would go to bring Castro to face charges in the US, Blanche said: “There was a warrant issued for his arrest. So we expect that he will show up here, by his own will or by another way.”

The federal government, he said, indicts people outside the United States “all the time” and uses a variety of methods to bring them to justice.

Cuban president condemns indictment

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel condemned the indictment and accused the US of lying and manipulating the events of 1996. He called it “a political action without any legal basis” that only seeks to “bolster the case they are fabricating to justify the folly of a military aggression against Cuba”.

Díaz-Canel wrote on X that Cuba acted in “legitimate self-defence within its territorial waters after repeated and dangerous violations of its airspace by notorious terrorists”.

He said US officials at the time had been warned about the violations but allowed them to continue.