The policy of the current U.S. government towards Cuba has been characterized by aggression.

Nearly twenty measures have been taken by Donald Trump and his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, against the Caribbean nation in just over 100 days in the White House. In this regard, the Deputy Director of the U.S. Directorate of the Cuban Foreign Ministry, Johana Tablada, commented exclusively for Prensa Latina.

This policy, as we expected, has also been characterized by aggression, maximum aggression. In less than four months, in the first 100 days, the government of President Trump and the government of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has been subcontracted or voluntarily asked to be put in charge of the policy against Cuba, have taken more than ten measures against our country, our people. Nearly 14 measures against Cuba, all with a high impact, not only in the area of symbolism or condemnation, but a deliberately directed impact, aimed at causing shortages in our population.

One of the most unfounded statements that can be heard today from the U.S. government on any topic is that the shortages suffered by the people of Cuba today have nothing to do with the blockade, as the head of the U.S. Diplomatic Mission in Cuba said a few hours ago. It is absolutely a lie. The U.S. Chargé d’Affaires is lying and knows it. And those of us who hear him, both in public media and those of us who have to work daily with the U.S. government, know it too.

This is a lie that, in addition, does not hold up; and it does not hold up because a simple search of the U.S. State Department’s system of coercive measures or regulations against Cuba quickly shows that Cuba is today the country under the largest system of unilateral coercive measures in the world, applied for the longest period of time, and that today qualifies as economic warfare; and it qualifies as economic warfare, by the extent of its impacts. And we could, perhaps, list the toughest measures; but we are talking about hundreds of measures, which have accumulated over time, and additional measures that Marco Rubio himself, in the previous Trump period, along with Mauricio Claver-Carone, John Bolton and Pompeo, took care to apply in a short period of time, and which had a very large and very visible impact, which was that emigration to Cuba soared to unprecedented numbers in its history.

And this is another of the contradictions in the current approaches of Marco Rubio, which, in addition, lead to false and fraudulent statements all the time in order to try to hide the direct link between the measures they have applied and the inhuman shortages suffered by the Cuban population, without deserving it; because Cuba does not have a single measure in place that affects the U.S. government, U.S. companies, or U.S. citizens.

So, what they are saying is absolutely ridiculous, and I’ll give you an example; that is, the measure to include a country with an exemplary record on terrorism in the list of state sponsors of terrorism has a direct impact on all that is the financial flow of a country, and Cuba’s has been made difficult, and it is increasingly difficult for Cuba to find out how to pay for a purchased good and how to receive funding related to a project, an investment, or a donation from an international organization, to which, in addition, Cuba is at a disadvantage.

The persecution of fuel: it is very hard and very ugly to see the highest representative of the country that attacks us saying that there are blackouts in Cuba and not mentioning or admitting, even when asked, that behind this is the largest persecution that has been organized in the 21st century against legitimate transactions and legitimate fuel exports to a country that, in addition, is an island, which does not have the Pan-American Highway, where a truck with fuel can reach Cuba; the fuel has to come by sea, and they pursue it: the ship, the shipowner, and the insurer.

There have been ships parked off the coast of Cuba that have not been able to dock because at that very moment, probably, the radar of the U.S. Embassy passed in front of it, the ship was identified, and the ship received a communication from its financial institution, or its insurer in London said, “You cannot disembark because we are being threatened.”