Castro's sister says she collaborated with CIA
Memoir tells of her disillusionment after the coup
|
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
MIAMI -- One of Fidel Castro's sisters says in a new memoir that she collaborated with the CIA against her brother, starting shortly after the United States' failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961.
Juanita Castro, 76, initially supported her brother's 1959 overthrow of the Batista dictatorship but quickly grew disillusioned, according to the Spanish-language memoir, which was released Monday. In it, Castro says the wife of the Brazilian ambassador to Cuba persuaded her to meet a CIA officer during a trip to Mexico in 1961.
By then, her house had become a sanctuary for anti-communists, and Fidel Castro had warned her about getting involved with the "gusanos," or worms, as those who opposed the revolution were called.
Castro said in "My Brothers Fidel and Raul: The Secret Story," that she traveled to Mexico City under the pretense of visiting her younger sister, Enma. There she also secretly met a CIA officer who identified himself as "Enrique" at the elegant Camino Real hotel.
A spokesman for the CIA declined to comment on Castro's account.
Castro said that, during the hotel meeting, she expressed her concerns that those who supported Batista's overthrow but were not communists were being pushed out of the new government. Castro writes that she agreed to help the CIA gather information, but refused to accept money for her efforts and said she wanted no part in any violence.
"I want to be very clear that agreeing to collaborate with you does not signify that I will participate in any violent activity against my brother, nor any official in the regime," she said she told the agent. "This is my most important condition. And moreover, I would say it is the only condition."
Castro said she remained on the island while her mother was alive, thinking she was protected from the full wrath of Fidel. Her mother died in 1963 and she fled Cuba the next year. She eventually settled into a quiet life in Miami, where she ran a pharmacy until 2007, and is generally well regarded by other Cuban exiles.
Fidel Castro, she wrote, was not initially a hard-line communist like Raul and fellow revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara. She said Fidel turned to communism to maintain power.
