[Peace-discuss] US death squads in Iraq, a tradition...

[C. G. Estabrook]

[This was published today by the Cuban News Agency. Kucinich's
statement is dated May 4 in the Congressional Record, and his
letter to Rumsfeld (apparently no response?) April 5.  This is
the first I've heard of it. --CGE]

     American Accomplice of Terrorist 
     Linked to Death Squads in Iraq

Havana, June 6 (ACN) US Army Colonel James Steele, who was
involved in the Iran-Contras scandal along with international
terrorist Luis Posada Carriles at his command, is now an
advisor to death squads in Iraq.

The presence of the US army officer in Iraq has just been
revealed by US Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich, Granma daily
reports.

Luis Posada Carriles, currently under arrest in the US charged
with illegal entry into that country, was the first to report
to Colonel Steele about the downing of a DC-3 aircraft in
Nicaragua and the arrest of Eugene Hassenfus, the incident
that led to the Iran-Contras scandal.

In a letter addressed to the US State Department, Kucinich
notes that Colonel Steele, a current advisor to the US
ambassador in Iraq, implemented a plan in El Salvador under
which tens of thousands Salvadorans “disappeared” or were
murdered, including Archbishop Oscar Romero and four American
nuns.

Colonel Steele has been assigned to the new counter-insurgence
unit known as the Special Police Commando, which operates
under the Iraqi Interior Ministry, said Kucinich.

A 1996 investigation by US journalist Robert Parry, who
formerly worked as a reporter for Associated Press, Newsweek
and PBS TV, revealed that Posada reported to two FBI officers
on his participation in the huge drug trafficking and weapon
smuggling operation at the orders of Colonel Steele, a close
ally of Colonel Oliver North and his bosses in the White House.

In his book titled “Caminos del Guerrero” (Paths of the
Guerilla), terrorist Posada Carriles boasts of his close links
to Steele and wrote that in El Salvador, he, Felix Rodriguez
Mendigutiand and Colonel Luis Orlando Rodriguez jointly
cooperated with Colonel Steel outside their formal bounds of
service.”

 In its article, the Granma newspaper points out that it is no
surprise that —having such powerful allies— Posada now enjoys
the protection and privileges that he is being given in El
Paso, Texas.

At the same time that Posada is being held in that city, five
Cuban anti-terrorist fighters remain in prison for having
risked their lives by infiltrating Florida-based
Cuban-American terrorist groups which served as faithful
accomplices of the US’ dirty wars against Latin America.

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