Lincoln Diaz-Balart. The
Washington Times. November 15, 2001
There is a new reality in the world. Even some states that until very
recently were clear enemies of the United States have now agreed to cooperate in
the global war on international terrorism. But the Cuban dictatorship has made
another choice: It continues to provide safe harbor for terrorists and insists
upon serving as the world's primary money-launderer for international terrorism.
Fidel Castro doesn't just provide his "revolutionary" banks for Puerto
Rican FALN terrorists like those who took their stolen millions from the United
States to Cuba. Laundering money for drug-dealers, terrorists and corrupt
politicians has become Mr. Castro's most profitable businesses.
While some continue to deny Mr. Castro's connections to international
terrorism, let us briefly review some public facts. In May, the Cuban dictator
visited Syria, Iran and Libya. In Iran, Mr. Castro declared that "together
Iran and Cuba will bring the United States to its knees." Later, in July,
Mr. Castro marked the anniversary of his political movement by hosting the
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader and leading hard-liner. On Aug.
29, an anonymous letter to Radio Cayman alleged that three Afghan nationals who
had recently arrived in Grand Cayman from Cuba were "agents of Osama bin
Laden . . . and are organizing a major terrorist attack against the U.S. via
airlines." The letter was ignored until the September 11 attacks. The three
Afghan nationals, who according to UPI had $2 million in cash in their
possession, were then detained by Cayman authorities.
Three suspected IRA terrorists were arrested on Aug. 11 in Bogota by
Colombian police. The terrorists were apparently providing specialized
bomb-making expertise to the Colombian FARC. According to the BBC and the Irish
Times, one of the three arrested, Nial Connolly, has been the official IRA
representative in Cuba since 1996, was training at several Cuban terrorist
camps, and was paid by Mr. Castro. Castro agents were middlemen between the IRA
and the Colombian FARC which, according to the State Department, has "a
permanent presence" in Cuba.
The Castro dictatorship also maintains what it calls "fraternal,
sustained and increasingly deep" ties with the Basque ETA terrorist
organization. Mr. Castro even refused to sign an international declaration
issued by the November 2000 Ibero-American Summit condemning ETA terrorism. The
only case of direct state terrorism against Americans in recent history occurred
on Feb. 24, 1996, when Mr. Castro ordered the shooting down by his air force and
assumed personal responsibility for the murder of three unarmed American
citizens and another U.S. resident over the Florida Straits.
There is a litany of evidence incriminating Mr. Castro. More than 90
U.S. felony fugitives wanted by the FBI for hijacking, murder, armed bank
robbery, the sale of explosives to Libya and kidnaping, remain in Cuba. An
Office of Technology Assessment report entitled "Technologies Underlying
Weapons of Mass Destruction" identified Cuba as one of 17 states possessing
bioweapons. In 1998, 10 Cuban spies in South Florida who were trying to
penetrate U.S. military installations were arrested and subsequently convicted,
including one of them for conspiracy to murder U.S. citizens. In 1999, Dr. Ken
Alibek, a former Soviet army colonel and deputy chief of Soviet bioweapons
development, declared that the Castro regime "has produced biological
weapons since 1991."
In February 2000, the FBI arrested a high-ranking U.S. Immigration and
Naturalization Service officer in Miami for conspiracy to spy for the Castro
regime. On March 4, 2000, the Associated Press reported that Cubans were present
at al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. In October 2000, Carlos Lage, a senior
official of the Castro dictatorship, traveled to Iran to inaugurate a
biotechnical research and development facility. In February 2001 before the
Senate Intelligence Committee, Adm. Tom Wilson, director of the Defense
Intelligence Agency, confirmed that "Cuban armed forces can initiate an
information warfare or computer network attack" that could "disrupt
our military" and that "their ability to use asymmetric tactics
against our military is significant."
In August 2001, two Cuban spies in Orlando, Florida were arrested.
According to the FBI, one Cuban spy who worked for the U.S. Postal Service at
Miami International Airport sent two detailed reports to Havana in 1998 about
the U.S. postal system (one is entitled to ask in this era of lethal letters why
Mr. Castro wanted to know all about the functioning of the U.S. postal system).
On Sept. 21, a senior analyst at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency was
arrested for spying for the Cuban regime. The FBI was forced to arrest her
before concluding its investigation because, according to intelligence community
sources, Mr. Castro is known to share intelligence with Middle Eastern enemies
of the United States.
While some other "terrorist list states" have begun to
provide intelligence to the United States, the Cuban dictatorship remains
closely linked to and serves as the private-international banker for multiple
terrorist organizations. As various lists of cooperating countries in the fight
against money laundering become publicly known, the role of international
terrorism's banker will become increasingly harder to hide.
Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart is a Republican from Florida.
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