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Boat

Exile pilots brave foul weather, mourn comrades

March 2, 1996
Web Posted at: 11:20 p.m. EST

KEY WEST, Florida (CNN) -- Braving harsh, stormy weather Saturday, 10 private planes flew over the area where two U.S. civilian aircraft were shot down by Cuban military jets last weekend.

Most of the planes were piloted by members of the Miami-based exile group, Brothers to the Rescue, which also organized Saturday's flotilla of two dozen small boats that eventually had to return home because of the foul weather.

Brothers

Before heading back to Florida, the vessels held a brief memorial service for the four men who are presumed dead in the shoot-down.

The group had wanted to conduct its maritime service in the area where the planes were destroyed, which Brothers to the Rescue says is about 21 miles north of Havana.

But choppy seas with waves reaching 7 feet and winds at 17 mph forced the flotilla to hold the service about 23 miles short of its destination.

Pilots carried bouquets and funeral wreaths to be dropped in the ocean spot where the planes were thought to have gone down. A smoke flare was also to be tossed out of one of the airplanes to mark the area.

Basulto

The U.S. Coast Guard accompanied the flotilla and provided a C-130 escort for the civilian airplanes.

Brothers to the Rescue leader Jose Basulto, who piloted a plane that survived last Saturday's shoot-down, said he was relieved that he had "the opportunity to say a last goodbye to my brothers."

Albright blasts Castro

Later in the evening, a community memorial service at Miami's Orange Bowl stadium was packed with some 45,000 anti-Fidel Castro exiles.

Many in the crowd cheered and wept as two Brothers' planes flew over the stadium. Waving U.S. and Cuban flags, the Cuban exiles banged on the bleachers and chanted, "Libertad! Libertad!"

U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Madeleine Albright, who spoke at the service, called the four downed pilots "martyrs" in the cause of freedom.

Albright Quote

Albright addressed the crowd from a platform decorated with elaborate floral wreaths, a cross, and large photographs of the four men propped at her feet. The program included hymns, the Cuban national anthem, and prayers.

In a speech frequently broken by thunderous applause, Albright said America would protect its citizens in international waters and international skies. "We will tighten sanctions against the government of Cuba, but without harming the people we want to help.

" ... Castro has been tried and convicted in the court of world opinion for his outrageous and brutal crime," Albright said.

Brothers to the Rescue has said its two planes downed a week earlier by Cuban MiGs flying over international waters were on a routine mission to search for Cuban rafters.

Havana, however, said the planes were blasted out of the sky for violating its airspace and ignoring warnings to leave.

Castro told Time magazine in an interview this week he would not tolerate any infringement of his country's territory. Castro said the U.S. failure to discourage American flights from frequently flying over Cuba, dropping leaflets, and provoking civil unrest was creating a condition of "distrust."

CNN has learned that the Cuban government will present its side of the shoot-down to the International Civilian Aviation Organization in Canada.

A Cuban delegation is expected to arrive in Montreal on Wednesday to present its case. The organization consists of more than 180 nations, including Cuba and the United States, and is a specialized agency of the United Nations.

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