The President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, demanded justice for the downing of a Cubana airlines flight over the island of Barbados, on October 6, 1976.
During his television program, In Contact with Maduro, the leader honored the 73 victims of the crime, among them 24 members of the Cuban youth fencing team, who were retuning to the country after winning gold medals at the Central American and Caribbean Championships of the discipline.
The Venezuelan head of state recalled that the massacre was planned in Caracas by terrorists of Cuban origin Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch, who employed two Venezuelans (Hernán Ricardo and Fre ddy Lugo) to plant the bomb inside the airplane.
The material authors of the crime were sentenced to 20 years in prison, while Bosch was released on a technicality and Posada Carriles managed to evade justice.
Maduro noted that the U.S. obstructed legal proceedings given the two aforementioned individuals’ links with the CIA at the time.
Posada Ca rriles illegally entered the U.S. on April 13, 2005.
In early May, a Venezuelan court approved an extradition request for Posada Ca rriles and, in June, the country’s Ministry of Foreign Relations presented a document supporting the petition to the U.S. Department of State.
Venezuela argued that Posa da Carriles is a fugitive from Venezuelan justice, who fled to avoid reprisals for the terrorist attack.
Cuba continues to denounce, in all international forums, the fact that this individual walks free on the streets of Miami without having answered for any of his crimes.
(Granma)