Cuba’s mom influencers share rare view of struggles under U.S. fuel embargo
A growing cohort are using Instagram and TikTok to share unmoderated coverage of the beleaguered island. Source link
All posts tagged: Cubas
Cuba’s collapse: From Obama’s historic opening to Trump’s embargo
HAVANA — A decade ago this spring, President Obama stepped off Air Force One at José Martí International Airport — the first time a U.S. leader had touched ground in Cuba since Fidel Castro’s communist revolution. More than half a century of Cold War hostilities were thawing. The U.S. had relaxed travel restrictions to the island, and Cuba had partially opened its economy to the private sector. Tourists were flocking in as a new class of Cuban entrepreneurs renovated crumbling buildings into restaurants, art galleries and hotels. One bright afternoon, Obama took in a baseball game with then-President Raúl Castro, the leaders of longtime enemy nations chatting behind home plate. A few days later the Rolling Stones played a free concert — their first in a country that once banned Western rock. Afterward, thousands of giddy fans thronged the malecón, Havana’s seaside promenade, laughing and drinking rum. Players with the Tampa Bay Rays join Cuban children during the opening ceremonies for an exhibition baseball game with the Cuban national team in Havana in 2016. (Robert Gauthier / …
Cuba’s president has a message for the US after Donald Trump said the island was ‘next’ for a takeover
Cuba’s president has said he won’t step down as he pushed back against mounting US pressure for change on the island. President Trump‘s rhetoric over displacing the communist regime has intensified recently, but Miguel Diaz-Canel told Sky News’ US partner network NBC News that “stepping down is not part of our vocabulary”. “In Cuba, the people who are in leadership positions are not elected by the US government, and they don’t have a mandate from the US government,” he told interviewer Kristen Welker. “We have a free sovereign state, a free state. We have self-determination and independence, and we are not subjected to the designs of the United States.” Mr Diaz-Canel took over from Raul Castro as head of the one-party system in 2018. “If the Cuban people understand that I am not fit for office, that I have no reason to be here, then I should not be holding this position of president, I will respond to them,” he said. Cuba’s 10 million or so people have been dealing with major blackouts in recent …
Trump has choked off Cuba’s oil supply. China is stepping in with solar.
China is helping Cuba race to capture renewable solar energy as the United States imposes an effective oil blockade on the Caribbean island, creating its worst energy crisis in decades. As the Trump administration steps back from U.S. climate commitments and reinvests in fossil fuels, China is flexing its dominance in renewable energy, using offers of equipment, expertise and financing as geopolitical levers. Source link
Cuba’s National Electric Grid Collapses, Leaving Millions Without Power
HAVANA, March 16 (Reuters) – Cuba’s national electric grid collapsed on Monday, the country’s grid operator said, leaving around 10 million people without power amid a U.S.-imposed oil blockade that has crippled the island’s already obsolete generation system. Grid operator UNE said on social media it is investigating the causes of the blackout, the latest in a series of widespread outages that last for hours or days and that this weekend sparked a rare violent protest in the communist-run country. Officials ruled out a major power plant failure, but had still not pinpointed the root cause of the grid collapse, suggesting a problem with transmission. Officials said they had begun restoring power to small clusters of circuits, or microsystems, across the country, an early but necessary first step in bringing the full grid back online. The United States has ratcheted up pressure this year on long-time foe Cuba since capturing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro – Cuba’s most important foreign benefactor – in January. U.S. President Donald Trump cut off Venezuelan oil shipments to Cuba and threatened …
Cuba’s economy on edge: Fuel shortages and rising hardship | Politics
Havana, Cuba – Eight days before United States President Donald Trump signed an executive order threatening tariffs on countries supplying oil to Cuba, 26-year-old twins Sandra and Sabrina Gonzalez received a devastating email. “Due to U.S. regulatory requirements, Airbnb must deactivate certain listings. Unfortunately, this applies to your listing(s) in Cuba … All upcoming reservations will be canceled today,” reads the email dated January 21. “By that point, all our booking dates had been blocked, and all our reservations from January to April had been automatically cancelled,” said Sandra, a resident of Havana. Sandra’s family has been running two bed-and-breakfasts through Airbnb since 2016, when Cuba’s tourism industry boomed following the historic normalisation of relations under the administration of former US President Barack Obama. Their business survived Trump’s tourism sanctions during his first term and the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. After further research, the sisters discovered that only Cuban hosts with US bank accounts linked to their listings had been affected. In a bid to salvage the situation, they tried to reach their guests …
How the U.S. Is Crippling Cuba’s Economy
new video loaded: How the U.S. Is Crippling Cuba’s Economy Cuba is facing its worst economic crisis in 67 years. Blackouts and fuel shortages have worsened after President Trump tightened restrictions on oil. Our international correspondent Frances Robles talks with Katrin Bennhold about the current situation in Cuba. By Frances Robles, Katrin Bennhold, Leila Medina, Alexandra Ostasiewicz, Rafaela Balster and Parin Behrooz February 24, 2026 Source link
Trump Oil Squeeze Chokes Cuba’s Tourism
VARADERO BEACH, Cuba, Feb 18 (Reuters) – Cuba’s Varadero peninsula is a postcard of a tropical paradise: turquoise waters, powder-white sand and palm trees. But the resort’s beaches, once crowded with tourists enjoying the sand and sunshine, began to clear out shortly after Cuba announced on February 8 it was running out of jet fuel. And they may not be coming back anytime soon. A Reuters survey of hotel and travel companies, airlines and on-island tourism industry workers found virtually every sector suddenly crippled by the fuel shortage. That could sound a death knell for an already hobbled industry vital to what remains of Cuba’s devastated economy. Air Canada, WestJet and Transat – the top carriers from Canada, the largest source of visitors to Cuba – have announced they are suspending flights to Cuba. That will lead to the cancellation of as many as 1,709 flights through April, according to analytics firm Cirium, a disruption likely to slash visitor numbers by the hundreds of thousands during the peak northern hemisphere winter season. Russia, the third-largest …
Cuba’s Santeros offer gifts and ask deities for peace as tensions rise with US
HAVANA (AP) — As tensions rise between the United States and Cuba and the island braces for more economic difficulties, priests and priestesses of the Afro-Cuban religion known as Santería held several ceremonies on Sunday, offering gifts to deities and asking for peace. Several leading figures in the Santería community prayed for the “spiritual healing” of the Cuban people and an end to the violence and conflicts that, according to their predictions in late December, would characterize this year. They chanted in ancient Yoruba, brought to the island by enslaved Africans and passed down orally. African and Spanish traditions syncretized, giving rise to Cuba’s strong Afro-Cuban identity. “We…believe that through sacrifices and prayers we can alleviate the impact of harmful issues,” said Lázaro Cuesta, a renowned priest who organized the ceremony in the courtyard of an old house. On Jan. 2, Cuban Santería priests known as babalawos predicted the possibility of war and violence that would affect Cuba and the world using traditional divining methods. A day later, on Jan. 3, the United States struck …
Cuba’s president says no current talks with the U.S. following Trump’s threats
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel and U.S. President Donald Trump. Sergey Bobylev | Nathan Howard | Reuters Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said Monday that his administration is not in talks with the U.S. government, a day after President Donald Trump threatened the Caribbean island in the wake of the U.S. attack on Venezuela. Díaz-Canel posted a flurry of brief statements on X after Trump suggested that Cuba “make a deal, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.” He did not say what kind of deal. Díaz-Canel wrote that for “relations between the U.S. and Cuba to progress, they must be based on international law rather than hostility, threats, and economic coercion.” He added: “We have always been willing to hold a serious and responsible dialogue with the various US governments, including the current one, on the basis of sovereign equality, mutual respect, principles of International Law, and mutual benefit without interference in internal affairs and with full respect for our independence.” His statements were reposted by Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez on X. On Sunday, Trump wrote that …