First modification:
In the General Assembly of the United Nations, 185 countries condemned the embargo to which the island of Cuba has been subjected for more than 60 years. The United States opposed lifting the measure as did its ally Israel. Although the UN resolutions are not binding, they show the international opinion on this matter.
For 30 consecutive years, the UN General Assembly once again voted massively against the existing economic embargo against Cuba by the United States. The government of Joe Biden continues with the strong policies that former President Donald Trump brought.
The votes of 185 countries condemned the measure, while the United States and Israel opposed it. The countries that abstained were Brazil and Ukraine.
The Government of Cuba, through its foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez, said that since 2019 the United States “has escalated the fence” around the country “taking it to an even more cruel and humane dimension, with the purpose of deliberately inflicting the greatest possible damage to Cuban families.”
According to Rodríguez, until May 2022, 14 months after Biden took office as president, the economic damage suffered by Cuba was about 6.25 billion dollars, which is equivalent to about 15 million dollars a day.
The foreign minister assured that Biden’s policies are the same “maximum pressure” as those of his predecessor Trump and affirmed that, despite some positive changes on US flights to the island, remittances and consular procedures, these do not counteract “US economic, commercial and financial measures,” and added that “the blockade, which has been tightened to the extreme, continues to be the central element that defines US policy towards Cuba.”
After the vote, the United States, through political adviser John Kelly, defended the embargo and said that it would continue to seek the freedom and dignity of the Cuban people, and that US policies focus on their political and economic well-being, and that strives “in democracy and human rights and fundamental freedoms”.
Kelly took the opportunity to recall that the Cuban government in July 2021 repressed hundreds of demonstrators protesting against the island’s government and demanding freedom. In addition to this, he asserted that the Government of Díaz-Canel has also “used harsh prison sentences, including against minors, intimidation, tactics, arrests, Internet interruptions, government-sponsored mobs and horrendous prison conditions to try to prevent Cubans from exercising their human rights.
Despite these claims, Kelly said that “the people of the United States and American organizations donate a significant amount of humanitarian goods to the Cuban people, and the United States is one of Cuba’s major trading partners.”
Cuba’s deputy ambassador to the UN, Yuri Gala, responded to these comments, saying that “if the United States government really cared about the well-being, human rights and self-determination of the Cuban people, it could lift the embargo” and “ they have not reversed the restrictions that are having a direct impact on Cuban entrepreneurs in areas such as software development, hospitality and other areas.”
Before the vote of the 193 member states of the UN, the Cuban foreign minister said that his government does not blame the blockade for all the difficulties that the island faces today, “but those who deny its very serious impacts would be untrue or they did not recognize that it is the main cause of the privations, shortages and hardships suffered by Cuban families”.
Rodríguez took the opportunity to accuse the United States of using the American communications giants and digital technology platforms “in a virulent campaign of disinformation and discredit against Cuba” and that the world’s largest economy uses “the most diverse methods of war not conventional” and uses “children, young people and artists as the target of this political and media bombardment.”
How was the vote at the UN?
This Thursday’s vote, which left 185 in favor of overturning the embargo and 2 against, was similar to that of previous years.
In November 2019 it was 187 in favor and 3 votes against: the United States, Israel and Brazil, while Colombia and Ukraine abstained.
In 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic the vote was postponed until June 2021. In that year it was 184-2 as the United States and Israel voted “no” and Brazil, Colombia and Ukraine abstained.
General Assembly resolutions reflect world opinion, but are not binding or enforceable.
The embargo dates from 1960 after the revolution on the island that brought Fidel Castro to power and after the nationalization of properties owned by US citizens and companies.
When Barack Obama was US president he reestablished relations with his counterpart Raúl Castro in 2016, that same year the United States abstained from voting in the General Assembly on the embargo, but when Donald Trump came to power in 2017 he again voted against the embargo. lifting of the sanction.
with AP
