MOSCOW, June 3 (RIA Novosti) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has alleged that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency was planning to shoot down his plane, Latin American press agencies reported on Wednesday.
Chavez was scheduled to attend the inauguration of newly elected El Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes earlier in the week, however, he cancelled the trip after a warning from Nicaragua's intelligence services of the plot.
According to intelligence reports, the plotters planned to shoot down the outspoken leader's plane as he flew to El Salvador.
"I don't doubt that the intelligence organizations of the United States are behind this," Chavez said, accusing them of plotting with Cuban militant-exile Luis Posada Carriles to organize his assassination.
Chavez said the intelligence provided indicated that Carriles, 81, was preparing to assassinate him, adding that "there is no doubt about it" because he would not have changed his trip on the basis of rumors.
Venezuela has asked the U.S. to extradite Carriles, a former CIA operative and opponent of former Cuban president Fidel Castro who is accused of plotting the 1976 bombing of a Cuban plane off Barbados that killed 73 people.
"The assassination was planned by Luis Posada Carriles' people," he said, adding: "I accuse Carriles and demand that [U.S. President Barack] Obama...hand this terrorist over to us so we can put him where he belongs - in prison for murder and genocide."
Chavez did not accuse Obama directly, saying that Obama "has good intentions," but beyond Obama there is "an empire - the CIA and all its tentacles."
Carriles is a Cuban-born Venezuelan anti-Castro militant and former CIA operative convicted in absentia of involvement in numerous terrorist acts. He has admitted his involvement in explosions, including a string of bombings in 1997 targeting fashionable Cuban hotels and nightspots.
In 2000, he was jailed in connection with an assassination attempt on Fidel Castro in Panama but later pardoned by Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso.
In 2005, Carriles was arrested in Texas on charges of illegal immigration but the charges were dismissed two years later. His release on bail in 2007 angered the Cuban and Venezuelan governments.
On September 28, 2005, a U.S. immigration judge ruled that Carriles could not be deported as if he was handed over to Venezuela he faced the threat of torture.
