Help Arrives for Cuba in Crisis, as Most Nations Stand Aside |
CounterPunch Exclusives
CounterPunch Exclusives
Help Arrives for Cuba in Crisis, as Most Nations Stand Aside
Image by Maksudur Rahman Rahat.
Streets and hospital corridors at night in Cuba are dark. Cars and buses don’t move. Cubans walk or ride bicycles. Trash doesn’t move. Trucks lack fuel. Offices, production units, and hospital operating rooms are closed down. Older people and babies are dying.
Oil tankers had not arrived for over three months, especially after the U.S. government on January 29 imposed tariffs on nations sending oil to Cuba. The action tops off a long, cruel and illegal economic blockade aimed at removing Cuba’s government. That government had offended by saying “No” to oppression and exploitation, “Yes” to national independence, and by acting accordingly.
Crisis like no other was at hand. Cuban President Miguel Diez-Canel assured visiting solidarity activists that Cuba “would not abandon its socialist principles of sovereignty and dignity.” He told interviewer Pablo Iglesias on March 27 that, “I share with my family that we would give our lives for the revolution. … [W]e, as revolutionaries, always prepare for the worst-case scenario.”
Then a reprieve: news came on March 29 that the Russian tanker Anatoly Kolodkin with over 700,000 barrels of oil aboard would be arriving in Matanzas, Cuba, on March 31. The vessel, sanctioned by the U.S. government in 2024, had followed a wandering course on its way to Cuba, accompanied by media speculation.
Organizations and individuals worldwide have been responding. The UK’s Cuba Vive Medical Aid Appeal recently raised £250,000 for Cuba. Solidarity activists in Italy and Spain are sending aid. Those in the United States are campaigning for donations to allow Global Health Partners and Global Links to send medical supplies. The Hatuey Project and the Los Angeles Hands off Cuba group have sent supplies.
The international Nuestra América (Our America) Convoy arrived in Havana in the days prior to March 21. The Progressive International had conceived of and organized this gathering of hundreds of solidarity activists from more than 40 countries. They brought tons of humanitarian materials.
Speaking at a welcoming event for participants, Gerardo Pisarello, Spanish parliamentarian for the Sumar Party, stated that, “We are here today to give back to millions of Cubans what they taught us as they sent out doctors, teachers, and vaccines out to the most remote corners of the world.”
The Mexican tuna boat “Maguro,” renamed “Granma 2.0,” departed from Progreso, Yucatán and arrived late because of bad weather. Abroad were 25........