The United States government announced this Monday (13) a new escalation of its aggressions against Cuba by decreeing sanctions against ten Cuban state entities, including the Ministry of Tourism and several companies linked to foreign trade, energy and maritime transport.
“The Department of State designates ten entities to advance the Donald Trump Administration’s comprehensive initiative aimed at ending the Cuban regime’s malign activities, both in Cuba and across our continent,” the United States government said in a statement.
In addition to the Cuban Ministry of Tourism (MINTUR), the Maritime Port Transport Business Group (GEMAR), the Foreign Trade Business Group (GECOMEX), the Antillean Export Corporation (ANTEX SA), among others, were sanctioned.
The new measures directly impact sectors such as tourism, foreign trade, maritime transport and energy supply, areas with a direct impact on the daily economy and the country’s ability to generate foreign exchange, import essential goods and maintain public services.
In response to this new escalation of aggression, Havana once again accused Washington of imposing “criminal and genocidal” measures.
Through a brief message published on social media, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez stated that the announcement of these “additional coercive measures is an unequivocal manifestation of the criminal and genocidal purpose with which the American rulers are committed to punishing the entire population of the country.”
Impact of sanctions
The measures are part of the blockade that Washington has imposed for more than 60 years. This is a policy of economic and political war that has intensified since the end of January, when the White House imposed energy suffocation against the Caribbean country, threatening to sanction any country that “sold or supplied oil” to the island.
Subsequently, in early May, the United States announced the expansion of the so-called “secondary sanctions”, through which Washington threatens to apply unilateral coercive measures against any non-US entity that maintains commercial relations with the Cuban State.
According to the United States Department of State itself, the new round of sanctions aims to affect the Cuban State’s sources of financing. “These measures target the interconnected pillars of this apparatus: state entities that channel revenues to the regime,” the statement states.
The measures entail the immediate blocking of any property or assets that the sanctioned entities possess in the United States or that are under the control of American citizens or companies. It also threatens to sanction any company or entity that carries out transactions with the designated entities, including when they are non-US companies or entities, according to OFAC, the body of the US Treasury Department responsible for developing and applying sanctions.
Washington’s blockade against Cuba — the longest in modern history — is considered by the international community to be a violation of international law and the Charter of the United Nations. Since 1992, the UN General Assembly has requested, every year and by a large majority, the end of this policy.
Last Saturday (11), after the blockade was discussed again at the UN, where Cuba’s position was supported, the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, stated that the United States will continue “using all the means at its disposal to face the threats to national security represented by the Cuban communist regime and to promote economic and political reforms that allow Cuba a better future”.
Source: www.brasildefato.com.br
