Demonstrations Friday, May 11 in cities across U.S., Canada and other countries will demand:
EXTRADITE POSADA TO VENEZUELA NOW! FREE THE CUBAN FIVE!
On May 8, Judge Kathleen Cardone dismissed all seven charges of violating U.S. immigration laws against confessed right-wing terrorist Luis Posada Carriles. The immigration charges were relatively minor compared to Posada’s real crimes, which include the bombing of a Cuban airliner in 1976, in which all 73 people aboard were killed, and the 1997 bombing of tourist hotels in Havana, Cuba. One person was killed and many others injured.
Posada’s release comes as a refusal of the Bush adminstration and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to formally designate Posada a terrorist in these proceedings. “International law declares terrorists as criminals who can be extradited, but Washington is protecting Posada, a former C.I.A. agent,” says Natali Fani of the Information Office of Venezuela, where he is still wanted on 73 counts of first-degree murder.
On Friday, May 11, the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition is sponsoring a major protest in El Paso, Texas, where Posada had been scheduled to go on trial, and along with other organizations in U.S. cities including New York, Washington DC, Boston, Philadelphia, Louisville, Chicago, Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco and elsewhere. Similar protests and pickets will be held across Canada including in Toronto, Winnipeg, Montreal and Vancouver. On Saturday, May 12, a protest demonstration will be held in Miami. Click this link for details on the protests in your area.
A special new documentary, just produced, “Posada: Terrorism Made in USA” will be premiered in El Paso, Washington DC, New York, Chicago, and elsewhere. Click this link for details on the protests and film premieres.
The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition holds the Bush administration fully responsible for the freeing of Posada Carriles, and is demanding that he be prosecuted for his terrorist crimes.
A letter-writing campaign on A.N.S.W.E.R.’s national website has sent 60,000 letters – 10,000 in just the last few weeks — to members of Congress calling on them to demand of the Bush administration that Posada be extradited, or tried in the United States for the 1976 Cubana Airlines plane bombing (that originated from Venezuela), in accordance with the Montreal Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against the Safety of Civil Aviation, 1971.
While pretending to wage a “war on terrorism,” the Bush administration has protected this mass murderer. The U.S. government has refused to extradite Posada to Venezuela to stand trial for his crimes, despite the fact that a legally-binding extradition treaty between the U.S. and Venezuela has been in effect for 85 years.
While Posada and his terrorist counterparts like Orlando Bosch today walk free in Miami, the Cuban Five remain locked in U.S. prisons, three of them serving life sentences. Their “crime” was coming here in an attempt to stop terrorist attacks emanating from the U.S. against their country by Posada, Bosch and their fellow terrorists.
