Sage 2-Tuesday, September 19,1978-The Michigan Daily
CUBAN LEADER DENIES ACCUSA TION:
Castro linked to JFK
WASHINGTON (AP)-The House
assassinations committee, in a
cautiously worded statement, said
yesterday it has been told there may be
some support for a report that Fidel
Castro knew in advance of an
assassination threat against President
John Kennedy.
Castro has called the report "ab
surd."
Rep. 'Louis Stokes,' (D-Ohio), the.
committee's chairman, refused to go
beyond an ambiguous statement that
said an unspecified source had infor-
med the panel that the story might have
substance.
A 4ND STOKES and committee chief
counsel G. Robert Blakey stressed that
the committee itself was not vouching
for the truthfulness of the report, only
passing on the opinion of the unnamed
source.
Blakey's statement said the story
was written by Comer Clark in the
tabloid National Enquirer. The story
said the Cuban consulate in Mexico City
told Castro that Lee Harvey Oswald
had threatened Kennedy's life.
Blakey said the committee in-
vestigated the writer's reputation for
truthfulness and "frankly, it was not
good."
But Blakey said the committee did
not ignore the story because of the in-
formation that it was supported by
reliable government sources.
THE COMMITTEE'S prepared
statement said it "has been informed
that the substance of the story is sup-
ported 'by highly confidential, but
reliable, sources available to the U.S.
government."
The committee issued the statement
as it released an interview with the
Cuban president in which Castro
vehemently denied the report.
"This is absurd," the committee
quoted Castro as saying in the inter-
view. "It has been invented from
beginning to end.
"It would have been our moral duty
to inform the United States," Castro
said.
CASTRO, TWO former Cuban con-
suli. in Mexico City and a consulate
secretary all denied in statements or
testimony to the committee that
Oswald made the threat when he tried
to get a visa for entry into Cuba.
Former Consul Alfredo Mirahal Diaz
said the story is "completely absurd. It
is completely false. It is a lie." And
former Consul Eusebio Azcue Lopez
said Oswald was angry and discour-
teous but'made no assassination threat
against Cuba.
Earlier yesterday, Azcue said he
believes a man who identified himself
as Lee Harvey Oswald and angrily
demanded a visa for Cuba in 1963 was
not the same man named later as Ken-
nedy 's assassin.
BUT AZCUE, now retired, told the
committee he could be convinced he
was wrong by scientific evidence.
Committee sources said such evidence
was forthcoming.
Azcue, testifying through a tran-
slator, told the committee the Oswald
who came to his consulate in Mexico
City was a "cold, hard" man, thinner
than Kennedy's accused assassin.
He said the man demanded an im-
mediate visa for entry to Cuba and
became unpleasant when told it would
require prior approval from Havana.
Azcue's recollections have caused
speculation that a second man might
iling
have posed as Oswald in an elaborate
conspiracy scheme.
"Fifteen years have gone by, so it is
very difficult for me to guarantee it in a
categorical sense," Azcue said, "but
my belief is that this gentleman was
not, is not, the person who went to the
consulate.
"I had a clear picture because we had
had anunpleasant discussion," Azcue
said. "He had not been pleasant to me."
But sources say a handwriting expert
will testify that the signature on the
visa application was written by the
same Oswald named by the Warren
Commission as Kennedy's lone
assassin. Azcue was asked if such test-
mony would change his mind.
"UNDER SUCH circumstances I
would have to accept that I was seeing
visions," the former consul replied.
Another Cuban employee, the
secretary who dealt with Oswald at the
consulate, said she is certain he is the
same man named by the Warren Com-
mission, according to a transcript of
testimony released by the committee.
Mrs. Sylvia Tirado Bazan said she
recognized Oswald's picture in
newspapers after Kennedy was
assassinated in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963.
She said she then looked at the pic-
ture on Oswald's visa ap-
plication-dated Sept. 27, 1963-and "I
saw that it was the same man."
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