Francisco Chávez Abarca: a very big fish

Terrorist’s Capture a Warning of Possible Conspiracy Against Venezuelan Government - español

Translation: Machetera for Tlaxcala

teleSUR (Caracas) – Venezuela’s lawyer in the Posada Carriles case, José Pertierra, warned that the terrorist recently arrested near the International Maiquetía airport (in the northern state of Vargas), Francisco Chávez Abarca, “is not the person who detonated or placed the bomb,” but the person who recruited killers to carry out the action.  He urged authorities to investigate “who was going to meet with this individual” during his time in Caracas.

Venezuela’s attorney in the extradition case of Luis Posada Carriles, José Pertierra, warned that the presence in this Latin American country of the terrorist Francisco Chávez Abarca, who was arrested this Thursday, could respond to a planned conspiracy against the government of President Hugo Chávez and even an attempt on his life.

“I’m sure that (Chávez Abarca) didn’t come to Venezuela to get some sun on Isla de Margarita.  It’s very probable that he had a hidden, terrorist plan,” Pertierra warned in an exclusive interview with teleSUR.

Luis Posada Carriles’ right hand man, Francisco Chávez Abarca, nabbed in Venezuela

"Potbelly" Francisco Chávez Abarca is on the Interpol Most Wanted list for his involvement in various explosive attacks in Cuba in the 1990's

Francisco Chávez Abarca, Posada Carriles’ Right Hand Man, Captured in Venezuela - español

Translation: Machetera for Tlaxcala

Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s president, reported today that the Salvadoran Francisco Chávez Abarca, accused of being Luis Posada Carriles’ right hand man, and the author of various explosive attacks in Cuba, was arrested in a nighttime intelligence operation on Thursday when he tried to enter Venezuela.

In an address from Miraflores Palace (the government headquarters), the Venezuelan leader explained that Abarca was arrested in the airport at Maiquetía (in the north) and was transferred to the headquarters of the Bolivarian Intelligence Service (SEBIN) for interrogation.

Nicknamed “Potbelly,” Chávez Abarca is on Interpol’s Most Wanted list due to his implication in various attacks with explosives in Cuba in the 1990’s.

Waiting for Posada Carriles to die

Telesur (Caracas) – José Pertierra: “The United States would prefer to see Posada Carriles dead rather than extradite him.” – español

Translation: Machetera

José Pertierra, the lawyer representing Venezuela in the case of the extradition petition for the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles, says that the U.S. Department of Justice is seeking a biological solution for the case.  The solution is to prolong the trial, because “the more time that passes, the more probable it is that he’ll die and do away with the extradition case.”

“That’s why, at every opportunity, the prosecution asks for a delay, because the solution they’re seeking is a biological solution; they’d rather see him dead than extradited.  It’s not that they want to kill him, but they know that he’s an elderly man and the more time that passes, the more probable it is that he’ll die and do away with the extradition case,” he said in an interview granted to teleSUR.

Washington’s Cuban cannery

“…a genuine national political movement cannot be manufactured in the capital of the enemy.  Parties and movements are not exportable commodities, because a political party cannot be bought and sold as though it were a can of spam… That this kind of foreign production might have any kind of legitimacy in Cuba is a myth that is only believed by those who do not know Cuba and do not live there.”

The War Against Cuba: New Budgets, Same Premise - español

José Pertierra

Translation: Machetera

Presidents in Washington come and go, but the end goal of U.S. foreign policy remains the same: derail the governments who dare to defend their national sovereignty and destroy any revolution that ventures toward a different world than that which is programmed for them.  The weapons that the United States has used in its offensive against Cuba have evolved over the last fifty years, but the war remains the same.

Cubanologists in Washington and Miami want to build a supposed socio-political movement in Cuba as a tool of subversion.  But a genuine national political movement cannot be manufactured in the capital of the enemy. Parties and movements are not exportable commodities, because a political party cannot be bought and sold as though it were a can of spam.

The devil wore white: Luis Posada Carriles and Ladies in White go out on a limb in Miami with Gloria Estefan

Posada Carriles at yesterday's march in Miami (March 25, 2010) Photo: Reuters

Posada Carriles and the Ladies in White, “Friends Forever” - español

By José Pertierra

Translation: Machetera

Only in Miami. Despite the seventy-three outstanding first-degree murder charges against him related to the mid-air explosion of a Cubana Airlines passenger jet, Luis Posada Carriles has not been extradited to Venezuela nor has he been indicted in the United States for these crimes.  He wanders unleashed and un-vaccinated along Calle Ocho in Miami, marching alongside Gloria Estefan in support of the so-called Ladies in White.

His support of the “ladies” ought not to surprise us.  There is an important link between Posada and these “ladies.”  The link is called Santiago Alvarez Fernández-Magriña.  It’s a well established fact, admitted even by the “ladies” themselves that their organization receives $1,500 a month from Rescate Jurídico [Legal Rescue] in Miami.  Posada and the “ladies” share the same godfather.

The president of Rescate Jurídico is no more and no less than Santiago Alvarez Fernández-Magriña.  An extremely close friend and Luis Posada Carriles’ financial sponsor, Alvarez was the person who brought Posada to the United States on his boat, the Santrina, according to documents from the U.S. District Attorney’s office.  A few weeks later, he organized the famous and shameful press conference for Posada Carriles who had up until that point been “hidden” in Miami.  Alvarez is also the same person who got one of his people to place two bombs in the Tropicana nightclub in Havana.  This conversation was recorded and exposed on Cuban television.

It’s evident that the terrorist history of this sinister person did not stop the “ladies” from involving themselves in this game and receiving money salted with Cuban blood.  In the United States, receiving money from a terrorist organization is a felony that carries a harsh punishment.  I suppose the same is true in Cuba.  Nevertheless, until now, the only sanction that these “ladies” have received is repudiation from Cubans in the street.  The Cuban government has shown itself to be extremely tolerant, even providing police protection.

Here’s a suggestion for Posada Carriles.  If he really wants to march in support of Santiago Alvarez Fernández-Magriña’s “ladies,” he ought to go to Havana to do it.  As Calle 13 would say, “I dare you!”

Machetera is a member of Tlaxcala, the international network of translators for linguistic diversity. This translation may be reprinted as long as the content remains unaltered, and the author and translator are cited.

Posada Carriles at yesterday's march in Miami (March 25, 2010) Photo: Reuters

Posada Carriles at yesterday's march in Miami (March 25, 2010) Photo: Reuters

Marketing war heats up among Cuba’s “dissidents”

Operation Marketing

Esteban N. Martínez for CubaDebate – (Español): Operación Marketing

Translation: Machetera

The interview President Barack Obama granted the “blogger” Yoani Sánchez is the culmination of a project I feel like calling Operation Marketing; aimed as it is at the promotion and visibility of a new counter-revolutionary figure in Cuba, in the face of the worn out and battered “dissidence,” fighting like a pack of wolves with fangs bared in search of their prey…money.

The promotion of Yoani Sánchez began some time ago, when Grupo PRISA granted her the Ortega y Gasset prize and another publication put her on their list of the “World’s  (100) Most Influential People,” although in her country she was completely unknown.

Oh what a (not so) tangled web we weave

Carlos Alberto Montaner

Is Carlos Montaner Really a CIA Agent? - Español

Analysis by Froilán Rodriguez

Translation: Machetera

In January of this year, the well-known writer and journalist Carlos Alberto Montaner granted an interview to Edmundo García in Miami, for his program “Night Moves.”  It was an interesting exchange, in which both defended their positions, although the intellectual came out rather badly against the moves made by the communicator.  On that occasion, the leader of the Unión Liberal Cubana stated unequivocally that he had never in his life been linked to U.S. intelligence.

However, this summer, we saw a controversy arise between Montaner and an unknown Cuban academic living in Denver, named Arturo López.  This fact in itself would be of little interest were it not that for the first time, the prominent anti-Castro man (Montaner) clearly admitted his access to information that at the least was confidential, hinting at specialized services, probably those of the CIA.

Arturo López Levy with Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter

It all started when López dared to criticize Montaner’s positions in relation to Honduras, in an article that he sent to the editors of the online publication Encuentro en la Red.  The article was not well received, nor was it published, mainly due to the fact that it attacked Montaner directly at a time when he was also under attack by the daily newspaper Granma, the official publication of Cuba’s only party.

Therefore, the professor, who says he’d sent other work to Encuentro, was forced to approach an alternative: Cubanuestra, in faraway Sweden, where his article was published, and the aggrieved Montaner was immediately made aware of it, resulting in an unexpected response.  And that is when the act occurred.

The company she keeps

“Tell me what company you keep and I’ll tell you what you are.”

– Miguel de Cervantes

The CIA sponsored fire at the El Encanto department store in Havana, April 13, 1961. Carlos Alberto Montaner was arrested in possession of incendiary devices shipped to him by the CIA.

Fe del Valle Ramos, killed in the fire at El Encanto. She had two small children.

John Negroponte - one of Yoani's admirers

Yoani Sánchez, John Negroponte, and Carlos Alberto Montaner: Project Blog? - Español: I, II

By Yohandry Fontana

Translation: Machetera

Part I

From now on, everything’s going to be different.  My blog will have to go a different direction or it will disappear, as happened two years ago when I thought the El País website was democratic, but it suddenly became permanently unavailable when Cuban and Spanish bloggers accused Yoani Sánchez of working for the CIA and being linked to Carlos Alberto Montaner.

Don’t worry, I’m not going to stop writing.  It’s just that I believe that now I’ll have to be more careful on the subject in question, yet without being silenced.  Refreshing memories comes at a cost.

Jefferson Morley’s struggle to find the truth about George Joannides and the CIA’s fight to hide it

First, a brief word of apology to Jefferson Morley, whose excellent and meticulously researched book, Our Man in Mexico: Winston Scott and the Hidden History of the CIA was first mentioned here almost exactly one year ago, with the promise of a review to come…like so many other worthy projects, the review ended up on the back burner (the saltmine beckons and is unusually active at present), but it has not been forgotten.  In the meantime, Machetera will say this: the book is terrific – engagingly written, carefully corroborated, it is a must-read for anyone curious about the CIA’s long reach in Mexico, particularly during the period in the fall of 1963 when the CIA did and then didn’t know about Lee Harvey Oswald’s visit to Mexico City in his failed search for a Cuban visa.  So get the book, now.

Second, José Pertierra has just published an exclusive interview with Morley at Cubadebate. 

Meet Pepe Hernández, CANF’s terrorist president

CANF’s President Admits Having Carried Out CIA Missions

Francisco José “Pepe” Hernández, president of the Cuban American National Foundation, reiterates that “just like me,” his friend Luis Posada Carriles is no terrorist

Jean-Guy Allard

Translation: Machetera

For Francisco José “Pepe” Hernández, the head of the Cuban American National Foundation, Luis Posada Carriles is not a terrorist.  The terrorist Hernández, who strives to advise President Obama, made this statement in an extremely long interview distributed from Miami by the Associated Press, in which he also admitted to having worked in different parts of the world on behalf of the CIA.

Pepe Hernández directly arranged the plans to assassinate Cuba’s president in Panama, in the year 2000.

It’s the second time this year that Hernández has acknowledged his links with the torturer, murderer and drug trafficker who, along with Orlando Bosch, planned and ordered the mid-flight destruction of a Cuban airliner in 1976, causing the death of 73 people.

“Public opinion presents him [Posada Carriles] as a terrorist, and he isn’t one,” said Hernández.  “Just like me, I always wanted to topple the Cuban government, but not terrorize the Cuban people,” he said.