FBI Adds to U.S. Case Against Militant Posada
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Saturday, May 5, 2007; Page A08
MIAMI, May 4 -- Authorities building an immigration case against anti-Castro militant Luis Posada Carriles have filed an FBI document with the court that provides new details about Posada's purported links to a wave of 1997 bombings in Havana.
The document, based on interviews conducted in the late 1990s with confidential sources, says Posada frequently met with two men who ran a Guatemalan utility company and indicates the bombings may have been planned in Guatemala.
A source told the FBI that a company employee discovered bottles labeled "high-powered explosives" in a closet. With them was a note in Spanish: "The tyrant has to be eliminated, regardless of how many others are killed."
The document was filed as part of the immigration case against Posada, 79, a former CIA operative accused of plotting the deadly 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner. He is set to stand trial next week in Texas on allegations that he lied to immigration authorities while trying to become a naturalized U.S. citizen.
Posada, a fierce Castro opponent, is wanted in Cuba and Venezuela to face trial, but the United States has refused to send him to either country.
The FBI document reveals details about the U.S. investigation into links between Posada and the Havana bombings. The probe -- which was mostly dormant until Posada's return to the United States in 2005 -- could provide an avenue for him to be charged in connection with the bombings.
The document focuses on interviews conducted with confidential sources involved in the utility company, where two men associated with Posada were principals.
One of the sources said that the men spoke about plans to assassinate Castro and that he began to suspect they were involved in "illicit activities." He had a listening device placed in one of the company's offices, the document says.
That device revealed discussions about smuggling a "putty-like explosive" into Cuba in the shoes of people posing as tourists, the FBI document said.
The source also told the FBI that another employee of the utility company found 22 plastic tubes in a closet in August 1997 labeled "high powered explosives, extremely dangerous." The employee also is said to have discovered that the explosives were being mixed into shampoo bottles. A notepad with Posada's name on it and the note were found in a carrying case, the source said.
