Cuba’s President Miguel Diaz-Canel has denounced what he referred to as an try by his United States counterpart, Donald Trump, to “suffocate” the sanctions-hit nation’s economic system.
Trump signed an govt order on Thursday threatening extra tariffs on international locations that promote oil to Cuba, the newest transfer in Washington’s marketing campaign of strain on Havana. The order alleged that the federal government of communist-run Cuba was an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US nationwide safety.
In a social media put up on Friday, Diaz-Canel mentioned that beneath “a false and baseless pretext”, Trump plans “to suffocate” Cuba’s economic system by slapping tariffs “on international locations that sovereignly commerce oil” with it.
“This new measure reveals the fascist, felony and genocidal nature of a clique that has hijacked the pursuits of the American individuals for purely private ends,” he mentioned, in an obvious allusion to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a Cuban American and a identified anti-Cuban authorities hawk.
Cuba, which is struggling rolling electrical energy blackouts blamed on gasoline shortages, was minimize off from important provides of Venezuelan oil after the US kidnapped Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro and his spouse in a bloody army night time raid on the capital, Caracas, earlier this month. At the very least 32 members of Cuba’s armed forces and intelligence businesses were killed within the January 3 assault.
The US has since taken efficient management of Venezuela’s oil sector, and Trump, a Republican, has issued threats in opposition to different left-wing governments within the area, promising to cease oil shipments beforehand despatched to Cuba.
Cuba’s International Minister Bruno Rodriguez on Friday declared an “worldwide emergency” in response to Trump’s transfer, which he mentioned constitutes “an uncommon and extraordinary risk”.
Venezuela’s authorities additionally condemned the measure in a press release on Friday, saying it violates worldwide legislation and the rules of world commerce.
Reporting from Cuba’s capital, Al Jazeera’s Ed Augustin mentioned Trump’s announcement “is an enormous psychological blow”, noting that analysts describe it because the “strongest financial blow america has ever dealt the island”.
Days after Maduro’s abduction and switch to the US, Trump urged Cuba to make a deal “earlier than it’s too late,” with out specifying what sort of settlement he was referring to.
In a put up on social media, Trump prompt Rubio may grow to be the president of Cuba. “Sounds good to me!” he wrote on his Fact Social platform.
‘There’s no answer’
In Havana, residents expressed anger at Trump’s tariff risk, which is able to solely make life tougher for Cubans already combating a rise in US sanctions.
“My meals goes unhealthy. We haven’t had electrical energy since 6am,” Yenia Leon informed Al Jazeera. “You’ll be able to’t sleep. It’s important to purchase meals each day. There’s no answer to the ability state of affairs,” she mentioned.
“This can be a warfare,” Lazaro Alfonso, an 89-year-old retired graphic designer, informed The Related Press information company, describing Trump because the “sheriff of the world” and saying he seems like he’s residing within the Wild West, the place something goes.
Alfonso, who lived by the extreme financial despair within the Nineties referred to as the “Particular Interval” following cuts in Soviet help, mentioned the present state of affairs in Cuba is worse, given the extreme blackouts, an absence of primary items and a shortage of gasoline.
“The one factor that’s lacking right here in Cuba … is for bombs to begin falling,” he mentioned.
In the meantime, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum mentioned she would search options to proceed serving to Cuba after Trump’s announcement following a call this week to quickly halt oil shipments to the island amid heightened rhetoric from Trump.
Mexico grew to become a key provider of gasoline to Cuba, together with Russia, after the US sanctions on Venezuela paralysed the supply of crude oil to the island.
Sheinbaum mentioned reducing off oil shipments to Cuba may set off a “far-reaching humanitarian disaster” on the island, affecting transportation, hospitals and entry to meals. She didn’t say whether or not Mexico would minimize shipments of oil or refined merchandise to Cuba, which she mentioned accounted for 1 % of Mexico’s manufacturing.
“Our curiosity is that the Cuban individuals don’t endure,” Sheinbaum mentioned, including that she had instructed her international minister to contact the US State Division to higher perceive the scope of the chief order.
Mexico equipped 44 % of Cuban oil imports and Venezuela exported 33 % till final month, whereas some 10 % of Cuban oil is sourced from Russia. Some oil can be sourced from Algeria, in accordance with The Monetary Occasions figures.
In November final 12 months, a senior United Nations skilled said the long-running US sanctions on Cuba should be lifted as they’re “inflicting important results throughout all points of life”.
The US imposed a near-total commerce embargo on Cuba in 1962, with the purpose of toppling the federal government put in place by Fidel Castro after he took energy in a 1959 revolution. Castro himself was the goal of quite a few assassination makes an attempt by the US’s Central Intelligence Company, or CIA.
Alena Douhan, particular rapporteur on the damaging affect of unilateral coercive measures on human rights, mentioned the “in depth regime of financial, commerce and monetary restrictions” in opposition to Cuba marks the longest-running unilateral sanctions coverage in US historical past.
She famous that there are shortages of meals, drugs, electrical energy, water, important equipment and spare elements in Cuba, whereas a rising emigration of expert staff, together with medical employees, engineers and lecturers, is additional straining the nation.
The accumulative impact has “extreme penalties for the enjoyment of human rights, together with the rights to life, meals, well being and improvement”, Douhan mentioned.
