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The United States Department of the Treasury designated nine high-ranking officials of the Cuban regime and three government entities this Monday, including the Cuban Intelligence Directorate (DGI, also known as G2), the main foreign espionage service of the Cuban State, in a new wave of sanctions under Executive Order 14404 signed by President Donald Trump on May 1, 2026.
The Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirmed the action in an official statement from the Department of State, in which he stated that he had designated "11 elites of the Cuban regime and three government organizations, including officials and military figures associated with the security apparatus of Cuba, many of whom are responsible for repressing the Cuban people."
The most significant institutional designation is that of the DGI, founded on June 6, 1961, whose assets under U.S. jurisdiction are frozen and whose transactions with individuals or entities from the United States are prohibited.
Furthermore, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) updated the entries for the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) and the National Revolutionary Police (PNR), which had already been sanctioned under the Global Magnitsky program, to also include them under the CUBA-EO14404 program.
Its executives, Oscar Alejandro Callejas Valcarce and Eddy Manuel Sierra Arias, received the same update.
Among the nine individuals sanctioned are Roberto Morales Ojeda, Secretary of Organization of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and member of the Political Bureau; Juan Esteban Lazo Hernández, President of the National Assembly of People's Power; and Mayra Arevich Marín, Minister of Communications and former Executive President of ETECSA.
Vicente De la O Levy, Minister of Energy and Mining, and Rosabel Gamon Verde, Minister of Justice, were also appointed.
In the military sphere, sanctions were imposed on four generals: Joaquín Quintas Sola, Deputy Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces; José Miguel Gómez del Vallín, head of Military Counterintelligence at the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces; Eugenio Armando Rabilero Aguilera, head of the Eastern Army; and Raúl Villar Kessell, head of the Central Army and member of the Central Committee of the PCC.
This is the second round of individual sanctions against the regime in less than two weeks.
On May 7, Marco Rubio announced the first designations under EO 14404, targeting GAESA, the military conglomerate that controls between 40% and 70% of the formal Cuban economy, along with its executive Ania Guillermina Lastres Morera and Moa Nickel S.A.
As a result of that first package, large shipping companies such as Hapag-Lloyd and CMA CGM suspended operations to Cuba, and the Canadian mining company Sherritt International halted its direct operations on the island.
The diplomatic context adds a layer of irony: just three days before being sanctioned, Morales Ojeda had publicly boasted about the "transparency" of the Cuban regime following the news of a high-level meeting between CIA Director John Ratcliffe and representatives of MININT in Havana on May 14.
Rubio was unequivocal in stating that the designated actors "are responsible for the suffering of the Cuban people, for the failure of the Cuban economy, and for the exploitation of Cuba for foreign intelligence, military, and terrorism operations."
The Secretary of State warned that "additional sanctioning actions are expected in the coming days and weeks."
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