Miami Herald. August 18, 2000
Cuba helps defense at spy trial
By Rui Ferreira. El Nuevo Herald.
Defense attorneys for at least two of the alleged Cuban spies arrested in Miami two years ago have an unusual ally in court: the Cuban government, which has allowed some of its officials to testify through affidavits.
The officials are a lieutenant colonel from the Interior Ministry, a professor at the University of Havana, and a couple of agents who claim to have infiltrated exile organizations in South Florida.
The witnesses' intent is to show that the "Wasp Network'' dismantled by the FBI in September 1998 was created to protect the island from terrorists -- not to spy on U.S. military installations, as the indictment charges.
"Terrorist groups among the Cuban émigrés constitute a real, present and tangible danger for the national security of Cuba and the United States,'' said José Luis Méndez, the university professor, in an affidavit submitted to federal court in Miami.
In a memorandum to U.S. District Judge Joan A. Lenard, defense attorney Joaquín Méndez (not related to the Cuban professor) said Cuba relayed to U.S. authorities the information it collected on the exile organizations.
Not only that, the lawyer said, the FBI recruited at least two of the alleged spies as informers to keep abreast of anti-Castro activities in Miami.
One was pilot Juan Pablo Roque, a Castro agent who came to Miami in 1992, infiltrated Brothers to the Rescue and returned surreptitiously to Cuba on Feb. 24, 1996, two days before Cuban warplanes shot down two of the organization's planes.
An FBI spokesman conceded at the time that the agency paid Roque almost $7,000 for information he provided.
"In fact, the evidence presented by the government shows that the federal authorities were as interested in the activities of these groups as the people accused of being Cuban spies,'' said Méndez.
The FBI never has admitted recruiting a second agent.
Two of the "Wasp Network'' defendants, Rubén Campa and Luis Medina, submitted to the court statements from witnesses in Cuba, taken by a member of the defense team based in Puerto Rico. Those statements suggest that the exile groups represent a danger to Havana, thus justifying the
presence of a network of informers in South Florida.
"All the documentation submitted so far by the [U.S.] government shows amply that Campa was not interested in American military installations or secrets,'' said Méndez, the attorney.
"Campa's alleged activities were intended to monitor the anti-Castro groups that are engaged in a series of campaigns to violently overthrow the regime of [President Fidel] Castro,'' he said.
According to the defense, individuals sent to Cuba by anti-Castro groups placed bombs in hotels and restaurants to harm the Cuban tourism industry. The individuals are not identified in the affidavits.
Another witness for the defense is Lt. Col. Roberto Hernández Caballero of the Cuban Interior Ministry, who investigated a wave of bombings in 1997.
After interrogating several suspects, including two Salvadorans who were sentenced to death last year for deploying seven bombs, Caballero concluded that the exile community was behind the campaign.
"I can categorically state that the plans to place bombs in Havana and in commercial airplanes bringing tourists [to Cuba] continue at this time,'' Caballero said in his deposition.
Both Caballero and Felipe Hernández, a security official at the Meliá-Cohiba Hotel in Havana, said tourist destinations in Cuba still receive telephoned bomb threats.
"The latest one came about 10 days ago,'' Hernández said.
The federal trial for four of the five defendants will begin in Miami on Sept. 5.
Sailors test the political wind on Cuba
Club edgy about Conch Republic races.
By Jennifer Babson. jbabson@herald.com. Miami Herald. August 18, 2000
KEY WEST -- They are touting it as the first "Conch Republic Cup,'' a series of four consecutive sailing and motorboat races that will take participants from Key West to points along Cuba's northern coast and back.
But organizers of the Key West Sailing Club's November extravangaza are rather nervous about their weeklong tournament, even as they try to entice 60 potential entrants into making the slog through the Gulf Stream at more than $140 a pop.
"We are pretty careful about who we let know about the race,'' said Peter Goldsmith, the race's organizer. "We don't even put it in the local newspaper.''
It's the fifth year the club has quietly sponsored an annual race to Cuba.
Goldsmith cites two fears: a backlash from the local Cuban exile community, which frowns on and has tried to quash events such as these in the past, and the kind of federal notice that has undercut similar U.S.-to-Cuba sailing ventures in recent months.
"We are worried about it all,'' he said, adding that he's concerned "people will protest out at our itty-bitty Key West Sailing Club.'' Nevertheless, the race is on.
The money raised from the race will be used to pay for a youth sailing program, Goldsmith said.
"Right now, we have to live and work in this community, and we are trying to be totally nonpolitical with this event.''
At the heart of both of Goldsmith's dilemmas is the 37-year-old U.S. embargo against Cuba.
The law prohibits Americans from spending money in Cuba unless they are visiting the island on a legally authorized, licensed mission: humanitarian aid, academic research, a cultural exchange, visits to relatives or journalism.
Still, American tourists continue in record numbers to make the trip directly by boat or airplane -- usually through a third country -- with dollars in hand. Actually going to Cuba is perfectly legal, assuming that visitors can prove to U.S. Customs agents, if they draw scrutiny, that the stay
was underwritten entirely by Cuban or other foreign friends, organizations or governments.
Prosecution for violating the embargo -- a rarity -- can result in up to 10 years in prison, thousands of dollars in fines, and the seizure of the boat involved.
That's where Club Náutico Internacional de La Habana, a kind of nautical Welcome Wagon, comes in.
Located at the foot of a canal in Cuba's Marina Hemingway -- the entrance point for most foreign vessels -- the club provides its dues-paying members, more than half of them Americans, with a letter vouching that the visitors didn't spend any money in Cuba because they were staying compliments
of the club. Náutico also sponsors most of the country's international fishing contests, including the annual Hemingway Marlin Tournament.
For "fully hosted'' contests like the one out of Key West, Club Náutico says it waives its fees and arranges for the elimination of others -- such as Cuba's departure tax and dock rental costs at the marina.
Sometimes, though, that approach doesn't work.
In May, a Náutico-sponsored, fully hosted "Havana Cup'' scheduled to depart from St. Petersburg was canceled after the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control issued a cease-and-desist order against organizers, saying they were operating as a "travel service
provider'' and therefore needed a federal license to stage the event.
But more than a dozen boats decided to go anyway, leaving Tampa Bay for Havana on the morning of May 26.
The protest sail took place on the heels of a Treasury decision to deny a permit to the organizers of a Baltimore-to-Cuba regatta, forcing them to start their tournament in Key West after it was first publicized with the more exotic origin. A number of boats dropped out.
It was the kind of debacle -- and limelight -- that most sailors try to avoid.
After an initial brainstorming session last spring over cocktails, members of the Key West Yacht Club decided by and large to wait a while before individually hoisting their sails for Havana.
When asked by a reporter about the prospective voyage, they got skittish.
"We don't want to create any negative publicity. We don't want to draw any attention to the yacht club,'' said Joanne Tarantino, one of the members who organized the session.
While boaters embark for Cuba every week from Key West, some would rather wait to see whether the embargo will soon be lifted, said Fran Molony, the yacht club's general manager.
"People are unsure of exactly what's going to happen when they get there,'' he said.
On the other hand, Molony said, those who visit Cuba regularly don't understand the anxiety. "I know people who have been going over for years and have never had a hassle. They can't understand what all the fuss is about.''
One of the exile groups that have lobbied to halt races such as the Conch Republic Cup is the Miami-based Cuban American National Foundation, which opposes efforts to ease sanctions while President Fidel Castro is in power.
"To pretend by having these sailboat races that they are promoting anything other than a dictatorship is really absurd,'' said foundation spokeswoman Ninoska Pérez. "It's sad that in the same waters where many Cubans have drowned, a lot of people who do not care about Cuba are
having a lot of fun.'' | 