US President Donald Trump hailed the indictment of Cuba’s former leader Raúl Castro on Wednesday evening but said he did not see the need for escalation, amid speculation that Washington would try to topple the communist state.
“I think it was a very big moment,” Trump told reporters when asked about the US charges against Castro, the 94-year-oldbrother of Fidel Castro, the late iconic US nemesis who led the 1959 communist revolution.
“There won’t be escalation. I don’t think there needs to be. Look, the place is falling apart. It’s a mess, and they sort of lost control.”
Those comments come after the Justice Department indicted Castro over the 1996 downing of civilian planes manned by critics of the communist state.
An unsealed indictment accused Castro and others of murder, conspiracy to kill Americans and destruction of aircraft.
“For nearly 30 years, 30 years, the families of four murdered Americans have waited for justice,” acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche said in Miami.
“My message today is clear: The United States and President (Donald) Trump does not and will not forget its citizens.”
Blanche also said he expected Castro to end up in prison, suggesting Washington could seize him if he does not surrender.
“We expect that he will show up here by his own will or by another way and go to prison,” he said.
The indictment of Castro was dismissed as a “political move with no legal basis,” by Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel.
The charges aim to “add to the file they are fabricating to justify the folly of a military aggression against Cuba,” he said in a post on X.
What is Brothers to the Rescue?
Brothers to the Rescue began operating in the early 1990s after 125,000 Cubans unexpectedly emigrated to the United States.
Founded by emigré José Basulto, it aimed to help refugees in the Florida straits by dropping supplies from small planes and alerting the US Coastguard to locate Cubans at sea fleeing the island.
US President Bill Clinton’s administration changed immigration rules to discourage Cubans from heading north on rickety, makeshift boats.
Meanwhile, Brothers to the Rescue, which is also known by its Spanish name Hermanos al Rescate, continued flying toward Cuban airspace and provoking Havana.
What happened to the planes?
On 24 February 1996, three planes carrying members of Brothers to the Rescue entered a zone close to the 24th parallel, a short distance north of Havana and some of Cuba’s highest-value targets.
Cuban fighter planes shot down two of the exiles’ unarmed civilian Cessnas, killing all four men aboard. A third plane, carrying the organisation’s leader, narrowly escaped.
According to a report by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the pilots of the Cessnas were not given any warning before being shot out of the sky by the air force jets.
Castro allegedly gave the order to open fire on the aircraft.
Relatives of the victims, US lawmakers and members of the Cuban exile community in the United States have pushed for years for Castro to face charges.
Power behind the scenes
However, there is no indication that Castro will be taken into US custody anytime soon.
He took over as president from his ailing older brother Fidel Castro in 2006 before handing power to a trusted loyalist, Díaz-Canel, in 2018.
While he retired in 2021 as head of the Cuban Communist Party, he is widely believed to wield power behind the scenes, underscored by the prominence of his grandson, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, who previously met secretly with Rubio.
“The symbolic nature is absolutely crucial,” said Lindsey Lazopoulos Friedman, a former prosecutor at the US attorney’s office in Miami who handled national security cases and crimes involving Cubans.
“Even though Raúl Castro will likely stay and die in Cuba, you can use the indictment as a pressure point, a tactical advantage, to extract other concessions like the release of prisoners or to keep Russia out,” she said.
