Hundreds of thousands of Cubans, led by President Miguel Diaz-Canel and former President Raul Castro, demonstrated in front of the US embassy in Havana on Friday to demand the lifting of the US blockade, a month before Donald Trump returns to the White House.
The demonstrators marched in front of the mission’s headquarters on Malecon Avenue, under the slogan “March of the people fighting against the blockade and the inclusion of Cuba on the list of states supporting terrorism”.
“We are marching to ask the government of the United States to let the Cuban people live in peace,”Diaz-Canel said in front of demonstrators who waved Cuban flags. The demonstrators chanted:” lift the blockade”,”we are not terrorists, remove us from the list”.
According to the authorities, 700 thousand people took part in the march, led by the current president and his predecessor Castro (93 years), who ruled the country between 2006 and 2021, succeeding his brother Fidel.
“We want to end the blockade, we need the restrictions to be lifted so that we can trade with all countries,” Rogelio Savini, 55, an official with a transport company, told AFP.
“If there had not been a blockade, we would not have faced difficulties of this magnitude,”said Faustino Miranda, 85.
Cuba is experiencing the worst economic crisis in thirty years, with shortages of goods, power outages and an unprecedented wave of emigration.
“When financial transactions are targeted and undermined,” Diaz-Canel said…) The Cuban people are deprived of food, medicine, fuel, goods, supplies and goods necessary for their survival”.
US President-elect Trump, who will officially take office on January 20, during his first term (2017-2021), ended the policy of openness towards Cuba initiated by his predecessor Barack Obama.
The Republican introduced 243 measures to tighten the blockade in force since 1962, while re-including the communist country in the US list of countries supporting terrorism, which includes Iran and North Korea.
His successor, Democrat Joe Biden, kept Cuba on this list and did not substantially amend the sanctions imposed on it, undermining financial and trade flows to the island.
Diaz-Canel stressed that 2024 was” one of the most difficult years “for Cuba, which lives”every day by day”.
