The main speaker was Gerardo Hernández, one of the five former spies accused in the US of participating in the conspiracy to shoot down the Brothers to the Rescue planes
14ymedio, Dario Hernandez, Havana, May 22, 2026 / In a new attempt to display popular support, increasingly weakened, the Cuban government called for another mobilization this Friday at the so-called Anti-Imperialist Tribune – located in front of the US Embassy in Havana – “to condemn the despicable and infamous act of the United States Department of Justice” –referring to the indictment made this Wednesday against Raúl Castro for the downing of the Brothers to the Rescue planes – “and to support the declaration of the Revolutionary Government.”
The official media presented it as a novelty that the call for the mobilization came from the Union of Young Communists, “along with other student organizations, mass groups, and youth movements.” The official statement also framed the event within the celebrations for Raúl Castro’s 95th birthday, on June 3rd.
Despite the severe fuel crisis that the Island is experiencing and that worsens every day, the Government has found resources to organize these mobilizations, which are coordinated in a mandatory way through state institutions and workplaces.
While Havana residents deal daily with the lack of transportation and authorities have applied drastic reductions to public mobility, a long line of buses waited in the early hours of this Friday after transporting attendees to the event, as shown in the photographs taken by 14ymedio.
The leak of an internal document from the Havana Electric Union, ordering the mobilization of workers, reveals the mandatory and controlled nature of these calls, with which the regime attempts to project an increasingly less credible image of popular support.
The mandatory nature of the rally is also evident in the large presence of uniformed military personnel and attendees wearing propaganda T-shirts distributed by state entities. “Raúl is Raúl” is one of the slogans of this propaganda campaign, which aims to counteract the effects of the indictment.
However, the Army general was not present at the ceremony, which has sparked speculation on social media. The nonagenarian is no longer in good enough health to make public appearances, and his presence at the May Day parade had already drawn similar comments due to his visible physical decline.
Miguel Díaz-Canel led the ceremony in military uniform, and among those present was the general’s grandson, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, known as “El Cangrejo” (The Crab). Also in attendance were the president of the National Assembly of People’s Power, Esteban Lazo; the prime minister, Manuel Marrero; and the commander of the Rebel Army, José Ramón Machado Ventura.
The five former Cuban spies were also present; their activity in US territory was fundamental for Cuban intelligence services to obtain information on all the movements of Brothers to the Rescue during the nineties, until the fateful February 24, 1996, when a MiG-29 shot down two planes of the humanitarian organization in international waters, causing the death of the four crew members, three of them with US nationality and one with legal residence in Florida.
To begin, the pro-government musician Raúl Torres performed a song dedicated to Raúl Castro. Following this, the pro-government lawyer Rolando López Meriño took the floor to express, on behalf of the legal profession, their rejection of the “scoundrelly accusation” against the former president and to reiterate the regime’s arguments against the legality of the charges brought by the U.S. Department of Justice.
“It is absolutely fraudulent and illegitimate,” stated López Meriño, who invoked the 1944 Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation to justify shooting down the planes as an act of defending national sovereignty. The lawyer also held the United States responsible for the incident, arguing that Washington ignored warnings from the Cuban government about alleged violations of national airspace by the Brothers to the Rescue aircraft.
López Meriño’s speech added nothing new to the official discourse, which has historically rejected Washington’s version that the downed planes were in international airspace, a conclusion supported by reports from the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR).
Gerardo Hernández Nordelo, one of the five former Cuban spies and accused in the US of participating in the conspiracy linked to the downing of the Brothers to the Rescue planes, was the main speaker at the event.
He paraphrased a “message from our comrade, the Army General,” to those present: “He tells us that he sincerely appreciates the solidarity of the people and of friends around the world, and that we can be certain that as long as he lives, he will continue marching at the head of our people, defending the revolution, with his foot in the stirrup.”
The former Cuban agent also lashed out at Cuban-American José Basulto, founder of Brothers to the Rescue and one of the figures linked to the current accusations against Raúl Castro. Hernández called him “one of the real culprits behind those tragic deaths” and accused him of seeking a confrontation between the two countries.
“Who do they think they are to judge Raúl?” Hernández Nordelo asked before launching into extensive praise for Castro. He also reiterated the official position on the downing of the Brothers to the Rescue planes, maintaining that the Cuban government had repeatedly warned Washington about violations of its national airspace. “We had and have a moral obligation to preserve the security of our people,” he said.
Hernández Nordelo questioned when US President Donald Trump will be tried “for ordering the killing of 200 people and 57 vessels in international waters of the Caribbean and the Pacific without showing evidence, solely on suspicion that they are drug traffickers.”
As soon as the former spy finished speaking, many attendees immediately began to leave the square, tired and eager to get on with their daily needs. Attempts to chant slogans were lackluster, mostly coming from the soldiers present.
Once again, the population, already tired and desperate in these long months of scarcity and prolonged daily blackouts, has taken on the obligation of attending these types of events, in order to avoid consequences in their respective state institutions, and so that the Government can demonstrate some popular support before public opinion.
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