Florida Issues Arrest Warrant for Raul Castro Amid Escalating US Pressure on Cuba

By Staff, Agencies

A Florida judge has issued an arrest warrant for former Cuban President Raul Castro, 95, the state’s attorney general announced on Monday, marking a further escalation in Washington’s months-long pressure campaign against Havana.

The warrant relates to the 1996 shooting down of two American planes operated by anti-communist Cuban exiles off the Cuban coast. US authorities accuse Castro of ordering the attack.

“Today, we are announcing state charges against Raul Castro with an arrest warrant for conspiracy to commit first-degree murder,” Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said during a press conference in Miami.

Uthmeier said prosecutors had collected evidence and witness testimony linking a Cuban spy network to the operation, which allegedly led Castro to order the aircraft shot down.

In May, the US Justice Department separately indicted Castro and five other individuals on charges including murder, conspiracy to kill US nationals and destruction of aircraft.

Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel denounced the indictment as a “political maneuver, devoid of any legal foundation,” accusing Washington of using the case as a pretext to justify potential future military action against Havana.

In February 1996, Cuban fighter jets shot down two aircraft operated by Brothers to the Rescue, a Miami-based Cuban exile group, killing four men. Havana has maintained that the action was taken in self-defense against aircraft that had violated Cuban airspace.

The CIA has a long history of collaborating with Cuban exile groups seeking to undermine the Cuban government, most notably during the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Washington imposed a sweeping trade embargo against Cuba the following year.

US President Donald Trump has intensified pressure on Havana under what he calls the “Donroe doctrine,” a modern interpretation of the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine aimed at asserting US dominance across the Western Hemisphere.

Following the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by US forces in January, Trump imposed a near-total energy blockade on Cuba and declared that the island would be “next” in line for regime change.

The restrictions have triggered a severe energy crisis across Cuba, contributing to widespread electricity shortages and frequent blackouts.

Meanwhile, Russia, China, Mexico and several other countries have provided humanitarian assistance to the island. Moscow delivered approximately 700,000 barrels of oil to Cuba in March.