October 19, 2026
Raul Castro, foto: Ismael Francisco
A U.S. court issued an arrest warrant against former Cuban President Raúl Castro, prompting Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez to condemn the move and label it a “maneuver” by sectors representing the “political rot” of the state of Florida.
In a post on his X account, the Cuban president wrote that the “reprehensible action against the Army General” was part of a “pathetic Miami circus, with an electoral backdrop” and asserted that the measure “has no legal basis whatsoever—nor will it ever have one—much less a practical one.”
“This ploy, cloaked in legal garb and orchestrated by anti-Cuban politicians against Raúl and against Cuba, deserves our firm condemnation. It is part of their aggressive agenda and a response to their failures in attempting to justify the blockade and collective punishment against our people,” Díaz-Canel stated.
For his part, the Cuban foreign minister said on social media that this “futile maneuver by anti-Cuban politicians in South Florida” is a “reflection of the political rot and moral collapse with which a group of parasites deceives and swindles its followers into continuing to contribute to fundraisers and provide financial support.”
The Arrest Warrant
The announcement of the arrest warrant against Castro was made by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier, who explained that the State Attorney’s Office and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement issued the warrant on charges of “conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in connection with the shooting down, on February 24, 1996, of two unarmed civilian aircraft belonging to ‘Brothers to the Rescue’ over international waters.” This organization is considered by Havana to be a narco-terrorist group.
Last May, U.S. authorities charged the former Cuban leader and five others with allegedly causing the deaths of four people, including three U.S. citizens, following the shooting down of two aircraft in 1996. Since then, Havana has maintained that the planes illegally entered its airspace and that it acted in accordance with the law after issuing dozens of warnings to Washington.
The Cuban leader is charged with conspiring to commit first-degree murder against U.S. citizens and will be held without bail.
What happened?
On February 24, 1996, two small planes were shot down over the Florida Straits by Cuban Air Force fighter jets. Four people died: Carlos Costa, Armando Alejandre Jr., Mario de la Peña, and Pablo Morales.
For three decades, the U.S. has falsely insisted that the deceased were innocent civilians on a humanitarian mission, a claim that has been refuted by various pieces of evidence.
The organization ‘Brothers to the Rescue‘ was founded in Miami in 1991 by José Basulto. The official U.S. narrative has consistently portrayed him as a so-called “Cuban dissident” who was helping his compatriots reach the U.S., but according to available evidence, he engaged in prolonged paramilitary activity against the Cuban Revolution under the auspices of the CIA.
There is evidence of his participation in the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, as well as in numerous covert operations aimed at overthrowing the Cuban authorities, some of which he has even admitted to the press.
Beginning in 1994, “Brothers to the Rescue” began making incursions into Cuban territory to carry out subversive activities, such as dropping leaflets and anti-government propaganda over Havana. Two years later, in January 1996, it infiltrated a NBC news crew into the Caribbean nation to broadcast live footage of aircraft flying over the Cuban capital.
In response to these recurring incidents, the Cuban Foreign Ministry issued 25 diplomatic notes to the administration of then-U.S. President Bill Clinton, with the aim of warning him about the repeated violations of Cuban airspace and demanding the revocation of those pilots’ licenses. Despite the warnings, U.S. authorities systematically approved the flight plans and allowed the aircraft to take off.
Source: Cuba en Resumen