Notes from the Cuban Exile Quarter's Top 5 Most-Read Articles in 2020

 2020 was the 75th anniversary of the end of WW2, but the anniversary was over shadowed by the worse global pandemic since the 1918 Spanish Flu. COVID-19 and examinations of what communist regimes in China, Cuba and elsewhere could be covering up dominated the top five most read articles with three entries. On a "lighter" note the documentary "Operation Odessa" came in second place.

#1

 #2

 #3

 #4

#5

Operation Odessa: Documentary exposes relationship between Cuban spy and the Cali drug cartel

So crazy, it must be true

Cuban intelligence officer linked to Cali drug cartel featured in Showtime documentary

The Castro regime continues to deny its role in the international drug trade with strong denials by high level officials. Be that as it may inconvenient facts continue to arise that demonstrate otherwise. Right now on Netflix there is a Showtime documentary, Operation Odessa, that features a Cuban intelligence officer as a high level operator with the Cali Cartel, and is well reviewed with a 90% audience approval on Rotten Tomatoes. 

Miami residents, who were living in South Florida in the 1990s, would remember this scandal that involved the purchase of a Russian submarine to smuggle drugs and contraband into the United States, and its linkage to Porky's, a strip club in Hialeah, and was an important story reported in The New York Times in 1997.

Nelson Pablo Yester-Garrido in Africa with his Russian fighter jet

The Daily Mail in a March 13, 2018 article revealed how filmmaker Tiller Russell was able to reach Nelson Pablo Yester-Garrido  a.k.a "Tony" to be interviewed in the documentary. He had been putting out messages that he wanted to meet him to get the full story, the other protagonists in the conspiracy told him that "Tony" would never talk, then Russell got a message:

"'In Moscow, I got a text from Tony that said, “You’ve talked to the waiters; you should come meet the chef. Meet me in Africa for a cup of coffee … tomorrow.”’ Russell did as he was told and flew to the appointed city in Africa; as soon as he walked into his hotel room, the phone rang and he was instructed to be downstairs in five minutes, where Tony whisked him off in a Porsche Cayenne and they spent several ‘surreal’ days together; Tony showed the director his Russian fighter jet, which had $5 million in the cockpit as the fugitive’s getaway plan, and told his part of the story."

The full story is told in the documentary by the three criminal protagonists and the investigators who pursued them and tracked their crimes.

Pablo Tony Yester, the Cuban spy and drug lord who was wanted by the FBI for trying to buy a Russian submarine for a drug cartel and then hid in SA for a decade - he’s given a tell all interview in this incredible documentary. Must watch on @NetflixSA #OperationOdessa pic.twitter.com/2yF4Wkun0z

— Mandy Wiener (@MandyWiener) August 28, 2018

Along the way, it is revealed in the documentary that Nelson Pablo Yester-Garrido  a.k.a "Tony" would mock investigators sending messages from Cuba inviting them to come and get him. 

Turns out that Tony had been "hiding out" in South Africa with his Italian girl friend for 14 years, and was arrested in December 2017 when visiting Rome, Italy and extradited to the United States in July 2019 where he faces a life sentence for his many exploits in the world of international narcotics trafficking.