Film screening to mark 50 years since Cubana Flight 455 bombing

AN­GE­LO JE­DIDI­AH

Re­porter

The Cuban Em­bassy and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Friends of Cu­ba (TTFC) will host a film screen­ing on Oc­to­ber 17 to com­mem­o­rate the 50th an­niver­sary of the bomb­ing of Cubana Flight 455, which killed all 73 peo­ple aboard the air­craft on Oc­to­ber 6, 1976.

The event is sched­uled for 4 pm at the Noor Has­sanali Au­di­to­ri­um, UWI St Au­gus­tine, as part of ef­forts to raise aware­ness of one of the Caribbean’s dead­liest acts of ter­ror­ism.

Across the Caribbean, the an­niver­sary has re­newed at­ten­tion on the lives lost in the bomb­ing and the need to pre­serve the mem­o­ry of the tragedy.

On Oc­to­ber 6, 1976, the air­craft was trav­el­ling from Guyana to Ha­vana, Cu­ba, with sev­er­al sched­uled stops. Af­ter de­part­ing Bar­ba­dos, the plane ex­plod­ed fol­low­ing the det­o­na­tion of ex­plo­sives plant­ed on board, killing all 73 peo­ple, in­clud­ing 57 Cubans, 11 Guyanese and five North Ko­re­ans.

The an­niver­sary is ob­served re­gion­al­ly as Cari­com-Cu­ba Day Against Ter­ror­ism, in ho­n­our of the vic­tims.

Speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia, Cu­ba's am­bas­sador to T&T, Gus­ta­vo Daniel Vél­iz Oli­vares said Cu­ba does not view the air­craft bomb­ing as an iso­lat­ed in­ci­dent, as the coun­try has un­der­gone decades of sev­er­al ter­ror­ist acts against the coun­try.

“Cuban peo­ple nev­er for­get this one, but Cuban peo­ple have nev­er for­got­ten all the ter­ror­ist acts that af­fect­ed our dai­ly life. It's im­pos­si­ble,” Oli­vares said.

“Cuban peo­ple and the Cuban gov­ern­ment have to con­tin­ue a strong fight against ter­ror­ism. We are against all forms of ter­ror­ism. The Cuban po­si­tion al­so is to keep the Caribbean a place of peace.”

Mean­while, Move­ment for So­cial Jus­tice po­lit­i­cal leader David Ab­du­lah said the Cuban Em­bassy and TTFC had com­mem­o­rat­ed the bomb­ing for years be­fore a per­ma­nent trib­ute was es­tab­lished at Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port. Venezue­lan cit­i­zens Fred­dy Lu­go and Hernán Ri­car­do Lozano, who were in­volved in plant­i­ng the ex­plo­sives, board­ed the air­craft in Pi­ar­co. They lat­er re­turned and were de­tained fol­low­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions con­duct­ed by the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice, most no­tably for­mer top cop Ran­dolph Bur­roughs.

Ahead of the 40th an­niver­sary in 2016, Ab­du­lah pro­posed in­stalling a plaque at the air­port. He ap­proached then Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley, who agreed to the ini­tia­tive.

Ab­du­lah draft­ed the in­scrip­tion, which was ap­proved by the Gov­ern­ment. The plaque ho­n­ours the vic­tims while recog­nis­ing the role of the TTPS in the in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

“I'm sug­gest­ing that every­body go, that, you know, every­body who goes to the air­port, ei­ther to meet peo­ple, or to see peo­ple off, or peo­ple who are trav­el­ling, just take a mo­ment and go and vis­it that plaque, and, you know, just read those words, and, and re­flect on, on that in­ci­dent,” Ab­du­lah said.

He al­so ar­gues that the Cari­com-Cu­ba Day Against Ter­ror­ism needs more recog­ni­tion not on­ly lo­cal­ly but across the re­gion.