The Cuban Communist Party identified seven individuals of the ten that it claims were onboard a Florida-registered speedboat intercepted in a fatal shootout on Wednesday.
Among those named are two individuals the Castro regime had previously identified as “terrorists.” Friends and family identified the one man the Castro regime identified as killed by Cuban Coast Guard agents – Michel Ortega Casanova – as a Tampa-based “patriot” who was “obsessed” with ending the 67-year-old communist regime in his home country.
The Cuban embassy in Washington published a statement from the Interior Ministry on Wednesday announcing that it had used violence to intercept a speedboat traveling near northern Cuba.
“When a surface unit of the Border Guard Troops of the Ministry of the Interior, carrying five service members, approached the vessel for identification, the crew of the violating speedboat opened fire on the Cuban personnel,” the Cuban regime claimed, “resulting in the injury of the commander of the Cuban vessel. As a consequence of the confrontation, as of the time of this report, four aggressors on the foreign vessel were killed and six were injured.”
On Thursday morning, the official newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party, Granma, published an article accusing the individuals on the alleged speedboat of terrorism and identifying six individuals the communist regime purportedly has in its custody and a seventh killed in the shootout.
“It has been established that the neutralized speedboat, with the Florida registration FL7726SH, transported ten armed persons who, according to the preliminary declarations of the detained, had the intention of executing an infiltration with terrorist ends,” Granma claimed.
The Castro regime claimed that it found on the speedboat “assault rifles, short arms, explosive artifacts of artisanal construction (Molotov cocktails), bulletproof vests, telescopes, and camouflage uniforms.”
According to the state media outlet, the men detained were identified as Amijail Sánchez González, Leordan Enrique Cruz Gómez, Conrado Galindo Sariol, José Manuel Rodríguez Castelló, Cristian Ernesto Acosta Guevara, and Roberto Azcorra Consuegra. A seventh man, Michel Ortega Casanova, was identified as one of the four killed. As of Thursday morning, the Cuban government stated that it was still working on identifying the other three and had not been able to do so with confidence yet.
An eighth man identified as Duniel Hernández Santos was allegedly arrested in Cuba for planning for the arrival of the speedboat to the island.
Granma further identified all the people aboard as “Cubans residing in the United States.” This statement does not necessarily mean that the individuals are Cuban citizens, as the Castro regime identifies all ethnic Cubans in the United States as Cuban citizens and does not recognize the American citizenship of anyone ethnically Cuban.
The administration of President Donald Trump has not publicly confirmed any of the alleged facts shared by the Castro regime at press time. Secretary of State Marco Rubio instead offered significant skepticism when speaking to reporters on Wednesday night.
“I’m not going to speculate now because right now, still a lot of the information that’s out there is information that’s been provided by the Cubans. We are going to verify that information independently and reach our own conclusions,” Rubio said during a press conference on Wednesday in St. Kitts and Nevis.
“I have every reason to want our own information. We don’t generally make decisions in the United States on the basis of what Cuban authorities are saying,” he insisted.
Some of the information out of Havana has already been debunked.
Roberto Azcorra Consuegra, one of the men identified as detained on the island, spoke to Florida’s NBC6 affiliate on Wednesday night from his home in the United States, expressing “surprise” that he was on the list. Azcorra denied knowing of any such plan to infiltrate Cuba and fight the communists, though he suggested that he had long been an opponent of the bloodthirsty Castro regime, telling NBC6, “They know me. They know me well, they know it all.”
The names of Amijail Sánchez González and Leordan Enrique Cruz Gómez appeared on a list of alleged “terrorists” published by the Castro regime in 2023. The list was largely dismissed as spurious and intended as a form of transnational repression, as many of those listed are popular commentators on YouTube and elsewhere in the United States.
“Amijaíl Sánchez González also lives in Florida. Among other things, from social networks he offers financing for terrorist actions in national territory,” the regime claimed on its “terror” list. “When he was in Cuba, he was prosecuted for illegal possession and carrying of firearms, theft and illegal slaughter of livestock, injuries, illegal economic activity and reckless homicide.”
Friends and relatives in the United States confirmed that Michel Ortega Casanova, the man identified as dead by the Castro regime, was a prominent anti-communist in his community in Tampa and a member of the Cuban Republican Party. In a message on social media, Casa Cuba de Tampa, a Cuban cultural organization in the Florida town, honored Ortega as a “patriot, a man committed to the cause of freedom and a member of the Cuban Republican Party.” The Republican Party itself also confirmed membership but asserted that the events involving the speedboat were neither planned by nor in any way related to party activities.
“They did not go to Cuba to commit a terrorist act, they went to do what few have had the courage to do,” Wilfredo Beyra, who reportedly took leadership of the local chapter of the Cuban Republican Party in Tampa, wrote on social media, according to the Cuban independent outlet 14 y medio. “They went to try to make an extreme sacrifice to awaken the people for the freedom of Cuba.”
The Associated Press reportedly spoke to Ortega’s brother, Misael Ortega Casanova, following the news, who confirmed that his brother was “obsessed” with helping end communism in Cuba. He insisted that Ortega did not tell anyone in his family of any plans to invade Cuba. The brother also confirmed that Ortega had lived in the United States for over 20 years and was a truck driver.
Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.
Read the full article here