Castro's
Foes Raid Ships at Sugar Port
The
Associated Press
HAVANA,
Sept. 11 - Cuba said today that a "pirate vessel" entered a harbor in north-central
Cuba early Monday and fired more than sixty shots into a British freighter
and a Cuban ship. No casualties were reported.
The
Havana radio attributed the attack to "criminals armed and paid by the
United States."
[In
Miami, an exile organization known as Alpha 66 said its members had carried
out the attack.]
The
Havana radio charged that the attackers came from the United States. It
suggested that the firing on the British freighter, identified as the 7,043-ton
Newlane, had been meant as United States "pressure on some countries to
raise an economic blockade against Cuba." The United States State Department
has asked its ambassadors to try to persuade United States allies to keep
their shipping away from Cuba.
Havana's
Communist newspaper, Hoy, said the attack took place off Cayo Frances,
a small key across from Caibarien, one of Cuba's major ports situated 210
miles southeast of Havana.
The
newspaper said the raiders slipped into the Caibarien area at 2:50
A.M. yesterday on a white and gray launch about forty feet long.
Reports
from Caibarien said the Newlane had been hit thirteen times. The vessel
was loading 31,000 sacks of sugar, officials said.
The
reports said eighteen shots had hit the cabin of the Cuban vessel San Pascual,
described as a dock boat used to store molasses.
The
Newlane's captain, identified as S. E. Jenks, was quoted as having said
that the attack lasted two or three minutes, after which the raiders headed
northward.
A
spokesman for the British Embassy in Havana declined to make any immediate
comment on the attack.
This
was the second attack against Cuba by a marauder in less than three weeks.
On
Aug. 24, two vessels shelled a Havana hotel. Cuban exiles in Miami said
they had carried out the shelling but denied the raid was mounted at a
United States base. No injuries were reported in the earlier attack.
The
Havana radio made no mention of return fire from either the British ship
or the Cuban vessel in yesterday's raid.
The
attacking ship was described by members of the San Pascual crew as a launch
about forty feet long, mostly white but with a gray cabin and black stern.
After
firing on the two vessels the ship disappeared towards the northeast, the
broadcast said.
Exiles
who declined to be quoted by name said the attacking vessel had come from
Venezuela and had been manned by young Cuban Refugees.
The
Cuban freighter was said to be loaded with molasses.Its
destination was not given. Nothing was said about causalities on either
ship.
The
attack was reported to have taken place near Cayo Frances, a small island
off the coast of Las Villas Province the radio said. The area is a short
distance northeast of the port of Caibarien.
The
Havana radio also charged today that a United States plane flew over Matanzas
Province last Friday. This was the latest in a series of charges since
early July that Cuban air space had been violated.
Exiles
Describe Attack
Cuban
exile organization said today its forces attacked two Cuban ships and a
British freighter off Cuba's north coast yesterday and then engaged in
a running naval battle with pursuing helicopters.
The
group, known as "Alpha 66," issued a communiqué saying that "Cuban
patriots" staged the military operation "at dawn Monday." It said this
consisted of a naval attack on Cayo Frances for fifty minutes
After
the attack, the communiqué said, "helicopters of the Castro regime
pursued the Cubans for forty miles on the high seas, the chase culminating
in a naval battle in which the Communists quickly withdrew."
It
said all the "Cuban patriots" returned safe and sound to their base of
operations at a place in the Caribbean.
The
document was signed "Alpha 66, Puerto Rico," but there was no indication
that the organization was based in Puerto Rico.
The
communiqué said:
"The
Newlane, a vessel flying the British flag, which was loading sugar for
the Communist countries, was machine-gunned intensely.
“Then
the ship San Pascual, converted into a pontoon with a concrete base many
years ago, was boarded, dynamited and machine-gunned.
It
said a second Cuban ship, the San Blas, also had been attacked.
British
Ship Under Charter
The
Trafalgar Steamship Company said today its sugar freighter Newlane, left
Havana last night under charter and might have been one of the ships reported
attacked.
The
company said it did not know the destination of the 7,043?ton ship because
the charter had been arranged by agents for the Caribbean area.
Attention
has been focused recently on shipping to and from Cuba because of an increase
in military shipments from the Soviet bloc to Premier Castro regime and
reports that much of this is being carried in ships chartered by allies
of the United States.