Cuba’s military marks 49th anniversary

HAVANA (AP) – Communist Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces marked 49 years yesterday, celebrating military successes at home and abroad during the Cold War that came before the military refocused on bolstering the island’s post-Soviet economy.

Veterans of the Cuban Revolution and independence wars in Africa were gathering for a ceremony that also marked the 30th anniversary of Cuba’s military mission in Angola.

Cuba’s Revolutionary Armed Forces, which replaced the military that existed before the Cuban Revolution, traces its roots to December 2, 1956, when 82 rebels landed on the island on a yacht – the Granma – that sailed from Mexico.

The Castros were among the fewer than two dozen rebels who survived to reach the mountains, where they launched a guerrilla war against then-President Fulgencio Batista.

Although the Cuban military has refocused on domestic matters during the nearly 15 years since the Soviet Union’s collapse, it remains among the island’s most powerful and respected institutions.

Kidnappers release14 children kidnapped from Haitian school bus

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – Gunmen released 14 children who were kidnapped with their bus driver as they rode to school in the capital, while authorities worked to secure the release of an American missionary who was shot as he was abducted on the same day.

Thursday’s kidnapping spree highlights the chaos and violence still afflicting Haiti as the country prepares for a return to democracy. Gangs allegedly close to ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide frequently skirmish with 1,500 UN peacekeepers striving to take control of the volatile Cite Soleil slum in the capital.

It was on a main road near Cite Soleil that Phillip Snyder, 48, was ambushed and shot in the arm by men on Thursday and then kidnapped, police said. Snyder, president of Zeeland, Michigan-based Glow Ministries International, is being held within the sprawling and fetid seaside slum, police said.

Police had feared that the 14 children and their school bus driver would also be brought to Cite Soleil after they were kidnapped. But officers set up road blocks to prevent this, said police commissioner Francois Henry Doussous.

The children, aged five to 17, were released unharmed late Thursday.

The kidnappings came five weeks before national elections.

Authorities break up Puerto Rican drug gang said linked to 10 killings

PONCE, Puerto Rico (AP) – Authorities broke up a violent drug trafficking gang yesterday that may be involved in at least 10 killings in this US Caribbean territory, officials said.

Federal and state agents arrested 24 people in Ponce on Puerto Rico’s south coast. They were among 48 members of a drug trafficking organisation indicted by a federal grand jury in the capital, San Juan, on Thursday, said US District Attorney Humberto Garcia.

The alleged gang leader, Alfredo Martinez Figueroa, was arrested.

Figueroa and his co-defendants were charged with conspiracy to traffic in cocaine, crack, heroine and marijuana, and with laundering about US$40 million (euro34 million) in drug money.

They also were suspected in the killings of at least 10 people “whom they saw as a threat to the organisation,” said Sonia Torres, who heads the US Attorney’s criminal division. But they weren’t charged with murder since authorities didn’t have enough evidence against them.

Defence seeks more time in case of slain Canadian executive

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – A judge has given a lawyer for a man suspected of killing a wealthy Internet gambling executive more time to prepare his defence.

San Juan Superior Court Judge Fernandez Montanez Delerme on Thursday granted a request to delay a preliminary hearing to determine if there is enough evidence to charge Jonathan Roman Rivera, 22, with murder for the September 23 slaying of Adam Anhang.

The judge rescheduled the hearing for January 24, said deputy prosecutor Milagros Guntin.

Roman, a dishwasher who is free on $200,000 (euro171,000) bail, has denied killing Anhang, a multi-millionaire chief executive of an online gaming firm who was beaten and stabbed to death as he walked with his wife along the cobblestone streets of Old San Juan.

The suspect worked at Pink Skirt, a bar and restaurant owned by Anhang’s wife, Aurea Vazquez. She was wounded in the attack, which occurred in front of several witnesses.

Anhang, 32, had moved to Puerto Rico from Winnipeg, Canada, in 2004. He was chief executive officer of CWC Gaming, an online gambling and software company based in San Jose, Costa Rica.