Protests erupted overnight in Cuba after the government said it had completely run out of diesel and fuel oil, the energy supplies essential to its power generation.
Energy minister Vicente de la O Levy blamed US President Donald Trump’s near-total energy blockade of the communist island over the past four months for the crisis.
“We have absolutely no fuel [oil] and absolutely no diesel,” he said on Wednesday in remarks carried on state-run media. “We have no reserves.”
Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel called the country’s energy situation “particularly tense”, writing in a post on X that he blamed the “dramatic worsening” on the “genocidal US blockade”.
Images shared on social media showed protests had broken out overnight in parts of the capital, Havana, with residents banging pots and pans and burning blockades in the streets. There were reports of clashes with police.
Havana’s long reliance on Venezuelan oil supplies — which it traded for Cuban doctors and spies — was severed in January when US troops snatched hardline leader Nicolás Maduro.
Mexico delivered one oil cargo to Cuba on January 9 but then, under pressure from Trump, also halted shipments. In late January, Trump threatened tariffs on any country that supplied Cuba as the administration in Washington ratchets up pressure to try to bring about regime change.
Since then its sole delivery has been one shipment of 700,000 barrels of Russian crude that arrived in March. But that offered only a temporary lifeline for a nation limping from blackout to blackout.
Trump has said he could “take” Cuba or mount a “friendly takeover” and has begun talks to press the regime to liberalise its economy, reform its system of government and free political prisoners. The US is also seeking compensation for property seized following Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution.
Cuba has said it is open to discussing democracy, human rights, business possibilities and co-operation with the US on migration and drug trafficking but insists its political, legal, social and economic systems are not — and will not — be on the table.
Cuba produces only about 40 per cent of the oil needed to supply national demand and China has donated solar panels, alleviating some of the power crunch.
On Tuesday, the Cuban government ended price caps on the little petrol that is available on the island, after in February allowing the private sector to import some fuel. Prices had been set at around $1.30 a litre for premium petrol, which often fetches more than $8 on the black market. Many drivers have left their vehicles idle for months.
The oil blockade has provoked critical shortages and severe rationing in a country suffering the effects of decades of US sanctions.
The struggling tourism industry — a vital hard currency earner — has been decimated as airlines have grounded planes because of fuel shortages. Hospitals have cancelled surgeries, food distribution and rubbish collection services have been disrupted and there have been increasing numbers of protests.
De la O Levy acknowledged that nationwide power cuts had deepened further, with many neighbourhoods lacking power for up to 22 hours. The country’s antiquated power plants regularly break down.
Blaming the “failures of Cuba’s corrupt regime” for the island’s woes, the US state department on Wednesday said it was reiterating its “generous” offer to provide $100mn in “critical life-saving” humanitarian aid, but that the Cuban government had refused its help.
Posted by Desperate_Wear_1866
3 Comments
prediction
Trump will go el Presidente hunting just in time for another wave of protests in Iran to begin
No fuel left could spiral into chaos in Cuba. The Trump administration might wish for an immediate surrender by the Cuban regime, or it’s plausible that they let another oil tanker through in order to delay the issue for later on, given the threat of war breaking out with Iran again.
Let’s be honest, a sufficiently long energy blockade will be more effective than any invasion as the collapse of energy production is literally the end of modern civilization, so in theory should energy run so low that lights go off and manufacturing goes off production the leadership will literally have choice but to concede to literally anything because it will be potentially suicide without exaggeration to do so (a population without any manufacturing to speak off, with only medieval level capabilities will rebel, including the armed forces as they, presumably, won’t tolerate the most abject of living conditions that definitely include them). This could be the only way aside from invasion to strong arm Cuba to accepting anything, including democracy (Not that I think Trump would care to do this). The morality of such a act is disputable, but there’s no logical doubt that complete collapse in energy production would result in the leadership to caving into any demands.