Herald Staff Report

                                      Longtime anti-Castro warrior Luis Posada Carriles was
                                      hospitalized late Thursday night after he fainted in the
                                      Panama jail cell where he's being held in connection with an
                                      alleged plot to kill the Cuban leader, officials here said.

                                      The 73-year-old Carriles, who has a history of heart trouble
                                      and high blood pressure, is in stable condition, said officials
                                      at Panama City's Santo Tomas Hospital.

                                      Posada Carriles and three Cuban-American men from Miami
                                      were arrested in Panama in November on suspicion of
                                      plotting to kill Fidel Castro with a car bomb during a summit
                                      of Latin American leaders.

                                      Like Posada Carriles, the other three men -- Guillermo Novo,
                                      Gaspar Jiménez and Pedro Remón -- are all veterans of
                                      numerous anti-Castro plots during the past four decades.

                                      None of the men has been formally charged with anything,
                                      but they're being held while Panama studies an extradition
                                      request from Cuba.

                                      Panamanian police believe the four men planned to detonate
                                      a car bomb as Castro's motorcade passed. A Panamanian
                                      man who worked as their driver led police to a buried
                                      suitcase of plastic explosives.

                                      Posada Carriles faces a death sentence in Cuba, handed
                                      down after a trial in absentia during the 1970s for the
                                      bombing of a Cuban airliner. Castro, in asking for extradition,
                                      promised Posada wouldn't be executed.