Cuba scorns anti-Castro exile honored in Miami

By Jeff Franks

HAVANA (Reuters) - Days after he was feted in Miami as a freedom fighter for his anti-Castro activities, Cuban exile Luis Posada Carriles was scorned on Wednesday in Havana as a "terrorist" given haven by the Bush administration.

The two events showed that, nearly 50 years after their bitter parting, the gulf between the Cuban government and the Cuban American exile community remains as wide as the Florida Straits that separate them.

Posada Carriles, 80, is accused of masterminding the 1976 explosion of a Cubana Airlines jet in which 73 people died and 1990s hotel bombings in Havana that killed an Italian tourist.

The former CIA operative, who was involved in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion to topple Cuban leader Fidel Castro in 1961, was jailed for two years in Texas on immigration charges but released on May 8, 2007, and now lives in Miami.

At a press conference to mark the one-year anniversary of his release, relatives of bombing victims denounced Posada Carriles' decades-long campaign against the Castro government and accused the Bush administration of protecting him.

"As a nation, Cuba has not had a moment's rest in over half a century, shaken by the constant fear of enduring new acts of terrorism," they said in a statement read at the International Press Center in Havana.

"The monster, responsible for the deaths of citizens in three different continents, is named Luis Posada Carriles. On May 8th, it will be a year since he was set free in the United States, a country that claims to be the leader of a crusade against terrorism," they said.

They repeated calls for his extradition to Venezuela, where he is a wanted for trial on the 1976 plane bombing.

Under President Hugo Chavez, Venezuela has forged close ties with Havana and has frosty relations with Washington.

On Friday, Posada Carriles was honored at a Miami event organized by Cuban American supporters who, according to news reports, greeted him with handshakes and kisses.

The dinner, attended by 500 people, was to "recognize Posada as a great Cuban ... a great patriot who has suffered a lot," an organizer told the Miami Herald.

Margarita Morales Fernandez, whose father died in the plane bombing, said in Havana it was "shameful for so many people to support a terrorist."

Posada Carriles was released from jail last year when a U.S. judge threw out the charges against him, saying authorities had used deceit and fraud to make their case.

Federal prosecutors have appealed the ruling.

The case has been a thorny one for the Bush administration, which has led a "war on terrorism" since the September 11 attacks, but also draws critical political support from the Cuban American community.

(Editing by Patricia Zengerle)