Amid an oil blockade against the island, the US blames Cuba’s communist leadership for ‘standing in the way’ of aid.
The United States has offered $100m in humanitarian assistance to Cuba on the condition that the island’s communist government agrees to “meaningful reforms”.
The sum was made public in a statement from the US State Department on Wednesday, though the administration of President Donald Trump underscored it had made the offer privately in the past.
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But the $100m comes with strings: namely, that Cuba’s government commits to Trump-approved changes.
“Today, the Department of State is publicly restating the United States’ generous offer to provide an additional $100 million in direct humanitarian assistance to the Cuban people,” the statement said.
“The decision rests with the Cuban regime to accept our offer of assistance or deny critical living-saving aid and ultimately be accountable to the Cuban people for standing in the way of critical assistance.”
The statement marks the latest chapter in an ongoing pressure campaign designed to destabilise Cuba’s communist leadership.
Since Cold War tensions in the 1960s, the US has placed a comprehensive trade embargo on the Caribbean island, in part as a reaction to the Cuban Revolution.
It has become the longest-running trade embargo in modern history, and the US has justified its continuation by pointing to systematic repression under Cuba’s communist government.
But critics have denounced the trade embargo as worsening humanitarian conditions on the island.
The crisis reached a tipping point in January, after Trump abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a close ally of Cuba.
In the following weeks, Trump cut off Venezuelan funds and oil supplies to Cuba. He then threatened economic penalties against any country that supplied Cuba with fuel, implementing a de facto oil blockade on the island.
Since then, only one Russian oil tanker has reached Cuba in late March. That month alone, the island suffered two island-wide blackouts.
Cuba relies heavily on foreign imports of oil to power its ageing energy grid. Only 40 percent of its oil supply is produced domestically, according to the International Energy Agency.
The United Nations warned earlier this year that Cuba faces the possibility of humanitarian “collapse”, with public transportation grinding to a halt, food prices soaring and public services like hospitals struggling to keep the lights on.
Trump, meanwhile, has repeatedly threatened to shift his focus to Cuba after the US-Israeli war on Iran ends, saying the island is “next” on his list of countries where he would like to see regime change.
“As we achieve a historic transformation in Venezuela, we’re also looking forward to the great change that will soon be coming to Cuba,” Trump told Latin American leaders at a summit in March.
“Cuba’s in its last moments of life as it was. It’ll have a great new life, but it’s in its last moments of life the way it is.”
Earlier this month, the US president issued a fresh wave of sanctions against the Cuban government, accusing the island of posing “an unusual and extraordinary threat to US national security and foreign policy”.
Media reports have also indicated that the Trump administration has stepped up its surveillance flights around Cuba, possibly in preparation for a surge of military assets to the Caribbean.
In Wednesday’s statement, the State Department blamed the communist system for having “only served to enrich the elites and condemn the Cuban people to poverty”.
It did not mention the US role in the humanitarian crisis on the island but instead described Cuba’s government as a hurdle to delivering much-needed aid.
“The regime refuses to allow the United States to provide this assistance to the Cuban people, who are in desperate need of assistance due to the failures of Cuba’s corrupt regime,” the State Department wrote.
It added that, should Cuba accept its terms, the $100m would be distributed through the Catholic Church and “other reliable independent humanitarian organizations”, rather than through the island’s government.
