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Trial of Luis Posada Carriles Put Off

ESTADOS UNIDOS, June 11, 2009.— International terrorist Luis Posada Carriles won’t be tried until 2010, when he will face charges of fraud and perjury, as part of his application process to become an American citizen, it was reported on Thursday.

According to the AP news agency, a federal judge in El Paso accepted a postponement of the trial until February 1st, so that the lawyers of Carriles "have more time to prepare the case," which is an evident delaying maneuver of the case against this criminal.

Carriles, a former agent of the CIA and soldier in the US Army, has also been charged with having lied about his participation in the terrorist attacks on a series of hotels in Havana in 1997. This is the first charge of perjury formulated in the United States in relation to accusations of terrorist activities.

Venezuela and Cuba have reported the participation of Posada Carriles in the terrorist attack that took place in 1976 against a Cuban plane of Cubana de Aviación Airlines, in which 73 passengers died. Caracas has requested the extradition of Posada to Venezuela, to try him for this crime in that country.

According to the government, in six hours of interviews with journalist Ann Louise Bardach –the information was published in The New York Times-, Posada admitted to having planned a series of sabotage attacks on tourist locations in Havana, in 1997, in which young Italian Fabio di Celmo was killed.

Posada, who lives with his family in Miami, is also facing a deportation order. He was arrested in 2005, when he illegally entered the United States from Mexico. Afterwards, the district attorney charged him with perjury, and he declared that he had arrived in Miami in a boat that set out from Mexican territory. (Cubaminrex- Granma)

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