The world once again demands an end to the blockade against Cuba   |06 November 2023

Cuban foreign minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla

For the 31st time, the United States was isolated before the international community, which supported with 187 votes the resolution on the need to put an end to the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed on Cuba.

The document presented by the largest of the Antilles, which exposes the impact of the unilateral policy on all aspects of the Cuban reality, was approved on Thursday by the United Nations General Assembly, with only two votes against (United States and Israel), and one abstention (Ukraine).

Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, Cuba's Minister for Foreign Affairs, speaking before the deliberative body, said that the blockade is an act of economic warfare in times of peace, aimed at annulling the capacity of the Cuban government to attend to the needs of the population, creating a situation of ungovernability and destroying the constitutional order.

According to the Havana report, between March 1, 2022 and February 28, 2023, the damages caused by the embargo are conservatively estimated at US $4,867 million, which represents US $405 million per month.

The foreign minister denounced that since 2019 the United States escalated the blockade to an extreme dimension and adopted measures to try to prevent fuel supplies, increased harassment of commercial and financial transactions in third markets, and set out to intimidate investors and commercial entities of other countries, with the application of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act.

Rodríguez Parrilla condemned the arbitrary inclusion of Cuba in the list of State sponsors of terrorism, with which the White House tries to justify the coercive measures against the island.

According to the Cuban head of state, this decision implemented by the previous administration in Washington and maintained by the current administration, has harmful effects both for Cuba and for other nations, victims of the extraterritoriality of U.S. policy.

Since 1992, when the Cuban resolution was first presented, it has received the majority support of the international community, although the U.S. government persists in ignoring this claim.

By CUBANEW/Cuban News Agency