By Dave Sherwood
HAVANA, May 15 (Reuters) - U.S. plans to indict Cuba`s former leader Raul Castro over the downing of humanitarian planes two decades ago further increased tensions on the island on Friday, as the country struggles with its worst crisis in decades amid severe fuel shortages.
An indictment of the 94-year-old revolutionary icon would mark a major escalation in the pressure campaign against Cuba by the Trump administration, which has described the island`s communist-run government as corrupt
and incompetent as it pushes for change.
Cuba has yet to comment directly on the threat of indictment but Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez expressed defiance on Friday.
"Despite the (U.S.) embargo, sanctions and threats of the use of force, Cuba continues on a path of sovereignty towards its socialist development," Rodriguez said in a meeting of BRICS foreign ministers.
Reuters interviewed Cubans in Havana who said an indictment would only turn the clock back on negotiations with the U.S., further deepening the diplomatic crisis between the two nations.
Sonia Torres, 59, a Havana schoolteacher, saw a prosecution of Raul Castro, who for decades oversaw the country`s military then served as president from 2008 to 2018, as an affront to Cuban pride at a time of crisis.
"Cubans must always keep moving forward," she said. "If they try to process Raul, we`ll defend Cuba with sticks and rocks if we have to."
Tense relations between the neighboring countries date back to Fidel Castro`s 1959 communist revolution. Castro struck an alliance with the Soviet Union, then seized U.S.-citizen owned businesses and properties, stoking decades of tensions between the two nations.
The Trump administration has laid siege to Cuba since January, enforcing a de facto fuel blockade, issuing threats of military action and ramping up sanctions that have forced foreign businesses - including Canadian miner Sherritt International - to flee.
But an Castro indictment would mark a watershed moment, said Peter Kornbluh, an author of a history of secret negotiations between Cuba and the United States, who said an indictment would likely represent "the diplomatic endpoint" to negotiations.
"This was an ultimatum: It`s do or die time," Kornbluh said. "(The indictment) has created a fig leaf of legality for any military operations to seize or assassinate Raul Castro."
The United States has previously used criminal cases against foreign political figures to justify military actions, and Trump has threatened that Cuba "is next" after his administration in January captured Venezuela leader Nicolas Maduro.
His government called the military raid a "law enforcement operation" to bring Maduro to New York to face criminal charges.
The younger Castro is still viewed as the island`s most influential living leader and symbol of the Cuban revolution, although he no longer holds a formal government role.
BROTHERS TO THE RESCUE
A potential Castro indictment, the U.S. Department of Justice sources said, ties back to Cuba's 1996 shootdown of two planes operated by humanitarian group Brothers to the Rescue.
Cuba at the time defended the attack as a legitimate defense of its airspace but the U.S. position was later backed up by the International Civil Aviation Organization, which concluded the shootdown took place over international waters.
Fidel Castro said Cuba`s military had acted on "standing orders" to down planes entering Cuban airspace. He said brother Raul, then defense minister, did not give a specific order to shoot the planes.
Havana resident Eliecer Diaz, 45, said then, as now, Cuba had to defend itself in the face of U.S. aggression.
"That's an invasion ... and you have to defend yourself," said Havana resident Eliecer Diaz, 45. "If they are now thinking of prosecuting (Raul Castro), I think that is wrong."
(Reporting by Dave Sherwood, Anett Rios and Alien Fernandez in Havana, writing by Daina Beth Solomon, editing by Christian Plumb and Sanjeev Miglani)
