“We are struggling to survive; many times the money just isn’t enough. But we have to keep going.” Juan Licea, a 68-year-old retiree in Cuba, said that after Washington renewed its trade embargo on the island for another year on Tuesday, August 25.
The renewal falls under the Trading with the Enemy Act, the law President John F. Kennedy used to set up the embargo in 1962. Every US president since 1978 has signed it again each year.
Voices from the street
Life on the island is already hard. Rolling blackouts have become routine, and food and fuel are scarce. Taxi driver Antonio Rodriguez, 40, told AFP that those with power still get what they need while ordinary people face rising prices and gasoline shortages. His proposal is blunt: let the United States trade with Cuba “to see whether it’s the government or the embargo” that is to blame.
Retiree Marilin Leon called the new limits on energy supplies unbearable. Licea said many Cubans simply cannot earn enough to get by.
Havana and Washington trade blame
Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez answered on X. “This extension comes at the cruellest moment of the US offensive against Cuba in recent years,” he wrote. He called the embargo “a genocidal policy” and accused Washington of being “intent on suffocating an entire nation.”
Havana links its shortages of fuel, food and electricity to an American energy blockade imposed in January and to other penalties. Since returning to office, President Donald Trump, who has publicly spoken of taking control of Cuba, has stopped fuel shipments to the island and sanctioned entities tied to the state.
The US government rejects the argument. It says poor management and government policies inside Cuba are major causes of the crisis.
Sources
- 'It's the people who suffer': Cubans decry US embargo extension
- Cuba slams US' "cruel" trade embargo extension amid brutal food and fuel shortages
- Cuba condemns US extension of trade embargo on the island
