Posada Makes 1st Court Appearance

EL PASO, Texas -- An anti-Castro militant indicted on charges of lying to federal immigration agents in a bid to become a naturalized citizen made his first court appearance Tuesday.

Shackled at the wrists and ankles, Luis Posada Carriles was read the charges in a seven-count indictment made public last week but did not enter a plea. He was ordered held without bail pending a bond hearing Friday.

Posada, 78, a former CIA operative and U.S. Army soldier, has been held at an El Paso immigration detention center since May 2005 on a charge that he entered the country illegally through Mexico.

The indictment says Posada entered the country on a boat, instead of with the help of a human smuggler as he claims. It also alleges he lied about having a Guatemalan passport and using an alias, among other things.

His El Paso lawyer, Felipe D.J. Millan, said Posada will be transferred to the Otero County, N.M., jail.

The indictment was issued about three weeks before a Feb. 1 deadline set by a judge that forced the U.S. government to provide evidence justifying Posada's detention pending deportation.

Posada is wanted by the governments of Cuba and Venezuela to face trial on a charge that he plotted the 1976 bombing of a Cuban jetliner. But a federal immigration judge who ordered Posada out of the United States ruled he could not be sent to either country.

Several countries have rejected U.S. requests for Posada to be sent there.

Two men indicted on charges of refusing to testify before the grand jury investigating Posada also made their first court appearances Tuesday.

Santiago Alvarez, a Posada benefactor, and Osvaldo Mitat, who works for Alvarez, were also denied bond pending a hearing Friday.

Gary Weiser, their El Paso lawyer, declined to comment on the charges against them.