Washington impose sanctions targeting Cuban intelligence agency and senior leaders
The US Treasury Department announced Monday sanctions targeting Cuba’s main intelligence agency and a number of senior leaders and ministers, in the latest move by Washington to increase pressure on the Caribbean island.
A statement issued by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said that Washington is imposing sanctions on the intelligence agency and nine Cubans, including the ministers of communications, energy and justice.
The sanctions also included a number of senior Communist Party officials, and at least three generals.
Washington has been intensifying its pressure on Cuba since January, with US President Donald Trump hinting at the possibility of overthrowing the country’s leadership, similar to what US forces did in Venezuela earlier this year.
The United States cut off Cuba’s supply of Venezuelan oil, which had been providing the island with about half of its fuel needs.
Since January, the United States has imposed an oil embargo on Cuba, arguing that the island, located just 150 kilometers from the coast of Florida, poses an extraordinary threat to US national security.
Washington is threatening to impose tariffs on any country that tries to circumvent sanctions to help Havana.
The US oil embargo is exacerbating a humanitarian and energy crisis in Cuba, manifested in increasingly frequent power outages.
The government says it has exhausted its stock of diesel fuel and fuel oil needed to operate generators that meet part of the electricity production needs, in addition to the dilapidated power plants.
On Monday, Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said his country has the right to defend itself if it attacked by the United States.
The Cuban government accuses Washington of seeking a pretext for military intervention against it, after it sought to strangle the island’s economy through the embargo.
Diaz-Canel said any US attack would lead to a bloodbath with untold consequences, while reiterating that Cuba poses no threat to the United States or any other country.
