The Cuban prosecutor's office warned on the television program Hacemos Cuba that fuel theft on the island may be considered an act of sabotage, with penalties of up to 30 years in prison.
The statement, made by the chief prosecutor of the Department of Criminal Proceedings, Yudenia San Miguel Ramírez, marks a drastic tightening in the prosecution of economic crimes in a country where the energy shortage has become a daily crisis.
San Miguel explained that, given "the impact that fuel theft has on the national economy and public welfare," those involved in these incidents will be charged with the crime of sabotage, a penal category historically associated with attacks against state security.
According to what was said, even those who do not act with direct intent can be penalized if they "could foresee the consequences" of their actions. In other words, stealing fuel or indirectly participating in its diversion could be placed on the same legal level as an attack on strategic infrastructure.
The message was reinforced with images and figures from the Ministry of the Interior, whose lieutenant colonel Asmel Rojas Águila stated that between January and August 2025, 350 thousand liters of stolen fuel were recovered.
Rojas acknowledged that the incidents occur in both service stations and storage facilities, refineries, and power generation units, involving workers, custodians, and management.
"In many cases, there is complicity between employees and nearby neighbors," said the officer, while showing images of tanks, money, and private homes where the stolen fuel was stored.
During the program, the authorities from the Electric Union (UNE) and the state-owned company CUPET acknowledged failures in internal controls and in personnel selection, although they insisted that disciplinary measures and "preventive actions" are being implemented.
However, the tone of the debate made one priority clear: to strengthen punishment rather than acknowledge the structural corruption or the social causes driving these crimes.
The Cuban prosecutor cited a recent ruling from the Supreme People's Court that reinterprets “vandalistic acts” against strategic infrastructures as sabotage, which opens the door to categorizing any action affecting the generation or distribution of energy in that way. Theft of fuel, therefore, is treated not only as theft or misappropriation but as an act that threatens “national security.”
In a country where blackouts, shortages, and low wages force many Cubans to rely on the informal market for survival, the decision to classify fuel theft as sabotage illustrates the use of criminal law as a tool for political and social control.
The closing of the program was summarized by the host himself, Humberto López, with a phrase that seemed directed both at the workers and the entire population: "Stealing the resources of the people will always be very serious. If it involves fuel and affects the resilient Cuban, those responsible must know that the weight of the law will be very heavy." A statement that sounds more like a threat than a call for justice.
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