Hours before the start of the popular tribute to our 32 heroes who fell in the line of duty in the sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, it has been decided, as a fitting and well-deserved tribute, that all of them will be posthumously promoted in military rank.
Photo: Estudios Revolución
Hours before the start of the popular tribute to our 32 heroes who fell in the line of duty in the sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, it has been decided, as a fitting and well-deserved tribute, that all of them will be posthumously promoted in military rank.
Havana, January 14, 2026
“Year of the Centennial of Commander-in-Chief Fidel Castro Ruz”
THE MORTAL REMAINS OF OUR HEROES ARE NOW IN THE HOMELAND
At dawn on Thursday, the aircraft arrived carrying the mortal remains of the 32 Cubans who fell in Venezuela on January 3 while performing their duty. The people of Cuba will pay tribute to them today in Havana and tomorrow in the other provinces and municipalities, reported Canal Caribe.
ARMY GENERAL RAÚL CASTRO RUZ PRESIDES OVER FIRST TRIBUTE TO THE FALLEN HEROES AT JOSÉ MARTÍ AIRPORT
Led by Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, leader of the Cuban Revolution, and by the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, the first tribute to the fallen heroes is held at José Martí Airport. Cuba honors and receives the remains of the 32 combatants killed by the United States in the attack on Venezuela.
After the military ceremony, the funeral procession began its journey to the headquarters of the Ministry of the Armed Forces, where the posthumous tribute will be held with the participation of the people starting at 10 a.m.
The current US president’s elective affinities with drug traffickers are nothing new
Photo: JORGE
Following the unacceptable kidnapping of the legitimate Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, and Congresswoman Cilia Flores, U.S. judicial authorities have decided to revoke the accusation that the president led the Cartel of the Suns. For more than a decade, this accusation was used to delegitimize the Chavista authorities, and two months ago it became the central propaganda weapon to justify the blockade of the Bolivarian Republic, the murder of more than a hundred crew members of ships in the Caribbean, the bombing of a sovereign country, and the kidnapping of two of its institutional authorities.
Meanwhile, hidden under a thick veil of secrecy, U.S. President Donald Trump has become the first head of state to govern for the drug cartels. During his first term, between 2017 and 2021, the tycoon signed 144 pardons and 94 commutations of sentences. A large part of these pardons were granted to criminals convicted of drug trafficking offenses. The most high-profile case was that of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, sentenced on March 8, 2024, to 45 years in prison for leading a drug trafficking network that sold 400 tons of cocaine within the United States, in association with Mexican Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán. In its reasoning for the sentence, the court considered that Juan Orlando “turned Honduras into a narco-state between 2014 and 2022.” According to jurist Kermit Roosevelt, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, the pardons granted by Trump to those convicted of drug trafficking are the result of financial contributions made by lobbyists and/or relatives of the convicted.
The shameless modus operandi used to secure the release of drug traffickers was exposed in leaks disseminated by legislative advisors, who revealed Marco Rubio’s close ties to the BGR Group, a lobbying organization tasked with securing the release of Juan Orlando Hernández. This consulting firm presents itself as focused on “high-performance personalized advisory and lobbying services.” According to the Foreign Agents Registration Office (FARA), Juan Orlando Hernández hired the BGR Group from 2018 until the end of his term in 2021, paying $660,000 annually to promote his image in the halls of the Capitol in Washington. Before Juan Orlando Hernández smuggled 400 tons of cocaine through Miami, the BGR Group was responsible for coordinating and guiding Marco Rubio’s Senate election campaigns in both 2010 and 2016. According to several Democratic senators’ advisors, it was Rubio who put Juan Orlando’s relatives in touch with BGR, which explains the dissemination of reports by the consulting firm in which Juan Orlando Hernández was characterized as “a key ally in the fight against organized crime.”
Rubio’s connection to drug traffickers is a family affair. As a teenager, the current Secretary of State lived for periods at the home of his older sister, Barbara, who was married to Cuban Orlando Cicilia, a prominent figure in Miami’s Cuban exile community and a member of the “cocaine jockeys.” Marco Rubio’s brother-in-law was the subordinate of one of Miami’s mafia bosses, Mario Tabraue, who had participated in the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961. When Cicilia was arrested, several kilos of cocaine were found in the home where Rubio was staying. Tabraue was sentenced to life in prison and Cicilia to 25 years. But both were released from prison after becoming cooperating informants. Cicilia managed to reinsert himself into the Miami rat pack thanks to the current Secretary of State, who arranged for him to obtain a real estate broker’s license, a credential that is not granted to former drug traffickers. Marco Rubio, already in the political race, managed to overcome that obstacle. The business of the “cocaine jockeys” was recreated by Brian De Palma in his film Scarface. Tabraue is portrayed in the film as the gentle Tony Montana. Good guys.
The Trump administration’s leniency toward drug traffickers included pardoning Ross William Ulbricht, founder of Silk Road, the largest online marketplace for illegal pills. The beneficiary had been sentenced to life in prison—without the possibility of parole—in 2015. Alice Marie Johnson, imprisoned for cocaine distribution, and Ronen Nahmani, convicted in 2015 for selling synthetic drugs in Florida, were also granted pardons. Weldon Angelos, sentenced to 55 years in prison for possession of military weapons and drug trafficking, enjoyed the same privilege. The same favor was granted to Pastor Otis Gordon, who, in addition to administering communion, was involved in drug distribution. Roy Wayne McKeever was another who deserved presidential clemency: he had been arrested in 1989 for trafficking marijuana from Mexico to Oklahoma. Chicago mob boss Larry Hoover also received a pardon from the New York tycoon. His colleague, Baltimore drug lord Garnett Gilbert Smith, smiled along with his associates upon receiving the news of the pardon. Sam Topeka, sentenced to ten years in prison for selling 80 kilograms of cocaine, was also favored. The same clemency was granted to Christopher Anthony Bryant, sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2022 for possession of weapons and distribution of several kilograms of cocaine, 1,300 doses of heroin, 1,700 methamphetamine pills, and 1,300 fentanyl pills.
The current U.S. president’s elective affinities with drug traffickers are nothing new. Joseph Weichselbaum was his partner in a helicopter rental company used to transport millionaires to Trump’s casino in Atlantic City. He was also one of his investors in several of his real estate ventures. In 1985, Weichselbaum was charged with 18 drug trafficking offenses. On that occasion, something astonishing happened: the case was transferred from Cincinnati to Ohio so that another judge could determine the sentence. The judge appointed was Maryanne Trump Barry, the current president’s older sister. When the prosecution denounced the defendant’s proximity to one of her associates, Maryanne recused herself but handed the case over to her close collaborator, Judge Harold Ackerman. The latter “took pity” on the drug trafficker Weichselbaum, who was sentenced to three years in prison—of which he served only 18 months—while his subordinates were sentenced to 20 years in prison. Before the verdict, Trump had written a letter to Judge Ackerman characterizing Weichselbaum as a “scrupulous, sincere, and diligent person” who was “a source of pride for the community.” In short: a businessman with drug-trafficking associates, who pardons drug traffickers and uses the pretext of narco-terrorism to bomb, carry out extrajudicial killings, and kidnap a president. Almost a tautology.
The Bolivarian Government presented a posthumous Tribute of Honor to the Cubans who fell in the attack on Venezuela
Photo: Work by Michel Moro Photo: Granma
The tricolor flag at half-mast, a moment of prayer, seven artillery salvos, the certainty of eternity, because it was done with nobility… all the gratitude of the Bolivarian people.
Venezuela, and also Cuba, were moved the day before as they paid tribute to the heroes of both nations who, like an impregnable wall, “in unequal combat faced the imperialist enemy that desecrated the sovereignty of the Venezuelan homeland and protected the constitutional President, Nicolás Maduro Moros.”
The island was present at the ceremony, held at the Eclectic Monument of the Military Academy of the Bolivarian National Guard, because in the words of Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, member of the Political Bureau and Minister of Foreign Affairs, “honor and glory to the fallen combatants. Love and peace to the Venezuelans murdered by the imperialist horde.”
Cuba’s deepest solidarity with the brave people came in the name of Army General Raúl Castro Ruz and the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Party and President of the Republic, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, who, through X, also conveyed his heartfelt condolences and assured that “we share with the people and the Government of Venezuela the pain of seeing brothers and sisters murdered by the imperialist invader (…) We will not cease to denounce this criminal act,” he insisted.
For his part, the Foreign Minister reiterated the commitment to fight together and win, “loyal to the thinking of Bolívar and Martí, following the eternal memory of Chávez and Fidel in the year of their centenary.”
“The Bolivarian and Chavista Revolution and the Cuban Revolution, in their destinies and in their common struggle, will be examples for the liberation of the peoples of our America. We will continue our work in defense of peace, in international mobilization, in the campaign in defense of international law and the right to life and peace of the peoples, for the liberation of the constitutional President, Nicolás Maduro Moros, and our comrade Cilia Flores,” he said, after receiving, from Acting President Delcy Rodríguez, a posthumous Offering of Honor to the 32 Cubans who fell in combat against U.S. forces.
“The brothers of Cuba, sons of Martí and Fidel, are also heroes of this homeland,” said Delcy Rodríguez, “because as one people they fought in defense against the illegal and illegitimate aggression” of the United States. “We are united in love; our concept of homeland is that the homeland is humanity,” she said.
The president recalled the words of Simón Bolívar: freedom is the only goal worthy of human sacrifice. She emphasized that during last Saturday’s attack, “no one surrendered; here there was combat for this homeland, for our liberators, Bolívar, Miranda, Sucre, Ribas, Urdaneta, Manuela Sáenz, Ezequiel Zamora, for Chávez and for Venezuela.” That, she said, is the greatest satisfaction.
Information from the Revolutionary Government on combatants who fell in the line of duty in Venezuela
Victims of a new criminal act of aggression and state terrorism, the combatants knew how to uphold, through their heroic actions, the spirit of solidarity of millions of compatriots
Photo: Internet
As a result of the criminal attack perpetrated by the United States government against the sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in the early hours of January 3, 2026, 32 Cubans lost their lives in combat while carrying out missions on behalf of the Revolutionary Armed Forces and the Ministry of the Interior, at the request of their counterparts in the South American country.
Faithful to their responsibilities for security and defense, our compatriots fulfilled their duty with dignity and heroism and fell, after fierce resistance, in direct combat against the attackers or as a result of the bombing of the facilities.
Once their identities had been verified, the families of our fallen comrades were informed and received the heartfelt condolences and support of Army General Raúl Castro Ruz, leader of the Cuban Revolution, and Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, first secretary of the Party Central Committee and president of the Republic, as well as the heads of both ministries.
Victims of a new criminal act of aggression and state terrorism, the combatants knew how to raise high, with their heroic actions, the feelings of solidarity of millions of compatriots. The Revolutionary Government will organize the appropriate actions to pay them the tribute they deserve.
