Cuba Strikes Back as Trump Indicts Raúl Castro Over 1996 Shootdown

(MENAFN) Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel struck back Wednesday after the Trump administration moved to indict former revolutionary leader and ex-President Raúl Castro over the deaths of three U.S. nationals nearly three decades ago.

The U.S. Department of Justice unveiled a superseding indictment holding Castro responsible for the murders of four individuals — three of them American citizens — stemming from the Feb. 24, 1996 shootdown of two aircraft operated by Brothers to the Rescue. The 94-year-old Fidel Castro successor now faces formal criminal charges in the United States.

The announcement landed at a flashpoint moment, coinciding with deepening U.S. economic pressure and mounting military posturing against Havana — pressures that have left Cuba gripped by severe fuel shortages.

Díaz-Canel wasted no time, taking to X — the social media platform owned by U.S. tech billionaire Elon Musk — to denounce the charges as legally baseless and politically engineered.

"This is a political maneuver, devoid of any legal foundation, aimed solely at padding the fabricated dossier they use to justify the folly of a military aggression against Cuba," he wrote.

"The U.S. lies and distorts the events surrounding the downing of the planes belonging to the narco-terrorist organization Brothers to the Rescue in 1996," Díaz-Canel added.

U.S. prosecutors contend the Cuban military opened fire on the aircraft while they were conducting a humanitarian operation in Cuban waters. Havana has long rejected that account, insisting the interception was a lawful defense of its sovereign airspace. Cuba has also alleged that Brothers to the Rescue founder José Basulto was a CIA asset and a member of an anti-Castro network linked to acts of violence on the island.

Díaz-Canel went further, accusing Washington of blatant hypocrisy. "It knows full well—given the abundance of documentary evidence—that no imprudent action was taken nor was international law violated, as U.S. military forces have indeed been doing with their coldly calculated and openly publicized extrajudicial executions against civilian vessels in the Caribbean and the Pacific," he said.

The indictment's timing drew particular scrutiny, arriving on the anniversary of the Platt Amendment — an occasion the Trump administration and members of the Cuban diaspora mark as Cuban Independence Day. In a statement released to coincide with the date, Washington accused the Cuban government of spending seven decades devastating its own economy and repressing its population, describing the state as being on the brink of collapse.

Díaz-Canel rejected that framing outright, arguing it deliberately ignored the sweeping economic sanctions Washington has imposed on the island since the 1960s.

"Only deeply twisted minds could deny before the world the collective punishment imposed on an entire people, which is increasingly becoming an act of genocide," he said.

The Cuban president also directed sharp criticism at Trump's Jan. 29, 2026 executive order, which levies tariffs on any nation supplying oil to Cuba — a policy Havana blames for triggering an unprecedented energy crisis.

"It has long been the practice of that empire to wage wars and exterminate peoples on the basis of lies. Actions, not words, are the response Cuba and the world demand. Lift the blockade, and then we will see what happens," he said.

'Despicable Accusation'
The Cuban government issued a formal statement Thursday condemning the indictment in unequivocal terms.

"The Revolutionary Government condemns in the strongest terms the despicable accusation by the United States Department of Justice announced on May 20 and proclaimed for several weeks against Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, leader of the Cuban Revolution," the statement read.

Havana declared that the U.S. held neither "legitimacy" nor "jurisdiction" over the matter, and accused Washington of misrepresenting the circumstances of the 1996 incident — which it said followed a documented pattern of repeated airspace violations. According to the Cuban government, formal complaints were lodged with the State Department, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), citing more than 25 breaches of Cuban airspace between 1994 and 1996.

Cuba characterized its military response as "an act of legitimate self-defense" grounded in international law, specifically invoking the UN Charter and the 1944 Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation.

In a pointed counteraccusation, Havana referenced U.S. military operations it alleged resulted in civilian deaths in international waters — labeling those actions "extrajudicial executions" and "murders" under both international and U.S. law.

The government framed the indictment as one component of a wider strategy to legitimize what it called "collective and ruthless punishment" of the Cuban people through sanctions, an "unjust and genocidal energy blockade," and threats of military force.

"The Cuban people reaffirm their unwavering decision to defend the Homeland and its Socialist Revolution," the statement concluded, pledging "unrestricted and unchanging support" for Castro.

MENAFN21052026000045017169ID1111148165