The Cuban government denounced new sanctions leveled against the island nation on Friday as “collective punishment,” as the economic situation grows increasingly dire.
President Donald Trump implemented the new sanctions in an executive order on Friday, coinciding with the International Workers’ Day, or May Day, holiday. Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez was quick to respond, denouncing the actions as “unilateral coercive measures” amounting to “collective punishment on the Cuban people.”
“It is no coincidence that these measures were announced on May 1, the very day that millions of Cubans take to the streets to denounce the US blockade and the energy siege,” he continued. “While the US government represses its own people in the streets, it seeks to punish ours, who are heroically resisting the US imperialism’s attacks.”
Trump’s order announcing the sanctions began with a harsh condemnation of the Cuban government.
“The policies, practices, and actions of the Government of Cuba … continue to constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security and foreign policy of the United States,” the order read. “Not only are these policies, practices, and actions designed to harm the United States, but they are also repugnant to the moral and political values of free and democratic societies.”
The new sanctions constitute an expansion of previous sanctions, at a time when Havana faces an existential economic crisis and repeated threats of kinetic action from Washington.
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Cuba has experienced nationwide blackouts after the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by Delta Force commandos on Jan. 3 ended its central oil lifeline. Trump has repeatedly suggested that he will turn his attention to the island nation after the war with Iran concludes.
The communist government in Cuba has long served as a major thorn in the U.S.’s side, and the Trump administration’s new focus on the Western Hemisphere could signal its impending end.