Cuba envoy: US sanctions are 'pretext' for military
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- Lianys Torres Rivera, Cuba's chargé d'affaires in Washington, called US sanctions on Cuban leaders a 'pretext to make the American people think we are a threat' and described the broader pressure campaign as 'a war without bombs.'
- Raúl Castro, the 95-year-old former president, faces federal conspiracy and murder charges tied to the 1996 shootdown of two Brothers to the Rescue civilian planes; Torres Rivera called him a 'sacred symbol of the revolution' and said Cuba would defend him 'until the end.'
- Trump said Thursday the US would 'handle' Cuba 'as soon as we've finished' military operations in Iran — the same day Treasury sanctioned President Miguel Díaz-Canel, Castro's son and grandson, and other Cuban officials.
- The US energy blockade has produced blackouts of up to 20 hours a day in Cuba, along with food and medicine shortages and 'exorbitant' fuel costs, according to Torres Rivera.
- Marco Rubio told lawmakers Cuba is a national security threat because of its intelligence ties with China and Russia, and said he does not believe the Cuban system 'is capable of reform unless new people take over.'
- Torres Rivera said recent senior-level US–Cuba discussions have been 'professional and respectful,' but insisted reforms must come from within — not duress — pointing to Washington–Hanoi relations as her model.
Why it matters: For ordinary Cubans, the economic toll is already acute: 20-hour blackouts and food and medicine shortages. Diplomatically, the framing has hardened on both sides — Cuba publicly equates sanctions with a Venezuela-style prelude to intervention, while Rubio's national-security framing and Trump's explicit link to Iran operations leave escalation, not negotiation, as the U.S. posture.
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