Cuba’s Official Press Silences the Death of Colonel Accused of Torturing US Prisoners in Vietnam

Retired Colonel Eduardo Morejón Estévez died in Havana at the age of 82. (Twitter)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana 10 September 2021 — Retired Colonel Eduardo Morejón Estévez is the 10th Cuban military man to die since mid-July. With the notable difference that the official press has not announced his death, unlike what occurred with the previous officers.

The news was reported in a tweet published on September 7 by Elio Perera, from the International Policy Research Center, in Havana, with a photo of the deceased and this very brief message: “Eduardo Morejón Estévez passed away; he accompanied our delegation in the peace process in Angola. From his diplomatic anonymity, he did a lot for the Revolution. Your students love and respect you. Faithful to your example.”

Also privately, on his Facebook account, Tele Rebelde journalist Milton Díaz Cánter dedicated a funeral eulogy to the military man, although without specifying the cause of death or his age, 82 years. “A hasta siempre was felt today in the eastern sector of the Colón Cemetery, during the simple ceremony to accompany the ashes of Colonel (r) Eduardo Morejón Estévez, to his niche in the Veterans Pantheon of the capital’s main necropolis.”

On September 7, Díaz Cánter referred to Morejón as “an outstanding combatant, consistent with his ideas, a witness to a Cuba that with longing some dazed people try to hide.” Regarding the career of the military, the official journalist also said that “he rendered services of extraordinary value, among others, those related to the Cuban internationalist struggle in Africa,” in addition to participating “in all rounds of negotiations for peace in Southern Africa, in which Cuba was present.”

In the post referring to his funeral, the state reporter added: “A fighter from Playa Girón [the Bay of Pigs], and an internationalist in Yemen, Laos and Vietnam, during war conflicts against the US empire and Israeli Zionism, this Cuban with deep Camagüey roots leaves us a interesting historical reference that we must transmit to present and future generations.”

In a totally opposite tone, CiberCuba gives details about the deceased that paint him as a torturer in the Vietnam War and a corrupt man in the service of the Cuban government’s Gaesa military conglomerate.

Citing a Pentagon report declassified in 1996, the independent media reports that Morejón was identified by US pilots who fought in Vietnam as “one of their torturers, along with Fernando Vecino Alegret, Luis Pérez Jaén and Pedro Fumero.”

“I think I remember that the [Cuban] interest in the Americans who were in Vietnam was to try to detect if a person had been in the Southern Command or in the Cuban section of the Pentagon to try to get information from them about the operational plans against us, and I know that Morejón was there,” CiberCuba quotes in “an old comrade in arms” of the colonel who requested anonymity.

The article notes that Morejón had a long career in the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DIM), including “the military attaché in Angola,” as well as “the presidency of shell companies registered in Panama.”

Among the resounding statements of CiberCuba, is found that the deceased military officer “almost turned the Agentura section of the DIM into an agricultural and construction company, employing officers and other subordinates (…) sacrificing operational work.”

In addition, the obituary narrates that the military man received “food in boxes for his house,” “made a public display by smoking Cohiba cigars” and granted Russian-made Lada cars “to his cronies, registered as private vehicles,” but owned by the state.

When he retired, adds CiberCuba, Morejón received “a farm for his private exploitation and his children emigrated to the United States, where they set up computer and communications companies.”

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