US Indicts Raúl Castro for 1996 Plane Shootdown; Trump Sees No Need for Escalation

US President Donald Trump hailed the indictment of Cuba's former leader Raúl Castro on Wednesday evening but said he did not see the need for escalation, amid speculation that Washington would try to topple the communist state. [...] The indictment of Castro was dismissed as a "political move with no legal basis," by Cuban leader Miguel Díaz-Canel. [...] What is Brothers to the Rescue? [...] On 24 February 1996, three planes carrying members of Brothers to the Rescue entered a zone close to the 24th parallel, a short distance north of Havana and some of Cuba's highest-value targets. Cuban fighter planes shot down two of the exiles' unarmed civilian Cessnas, killing all four men aboard. [...] Relatives of the victims, US lawmakers and members of the Cuban exile community in the United States have pushed for years for Castro to face charges. [...] "The symbolic nature is absolutely crucial," said Lindsey Lazopoulos Friedman, a former prosecutor at the US attorney’s office in Miami who handled national security cases and crimes involving Cubans. "Even though Raúl Castro will likely stay and die in Cuba, you can use the indictment as a pressure point, a tactical advantage, to extract other concessions like the release of prisoners or to keep Russia out," she said.