The U.S. Department of the Treasury today sanctioned nine high-ranking officials of the Cuban regime and the Cuban Intelligence Directorate — historically known as DGI or "G2" — by adding them to the list of Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons, as reported by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).
The designations are framed within Executive Order 14404, signed by President Donald Trump on May 1, 2026, titled "Imposing Sanctions on Those Responsible for Repression in Cuba and for Threats to United States National Security and Foreign Policy." This order created a new sanctions authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, separate from the traditional Cuban embargo framework.
Among the nine individuals sanctioned are prominent figures from the Cuban power structure such as Roberto Morales Ojeda, the Secretary of Organization of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and a member of the Political Bureau.
Just three days earlier, Morales Ojeda had publicly boasted about the "transparency" of the Cuban government following the disclosure of a meeting between the CIA and MININT in Havana.
A historic official of the regime, Esteban Lazo Hernández, born in 1944 in Jovellanos, Matanzas, and president of the National Assembly of People's Power, also appears on the list. He is joined by Mayra Arevich Marín, Minister of Communications since April 2021 and former executive president of ETECSA.
The list of sanctioned individuals also includes Minister of Energy and Mines Vicente De la O Levy and Minister of Justice Rosabel Gamon Verde.
On the military side, General of the Army Corps and Deputy Minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces Joaquín Quintas Sola was sanctioned — the oldest member of the group, born in 1938 in Santiago de Cuba — along with division generals José Miguel Gómez del Vallín, Head of the Military Counterintelligence Department of MINFAR, Eugenio Armando Rabilero Aguilera, head of the Eastern Army, and Raúl Villar Kessell, head of the Central Army and a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC).
The most significant institutional designation is the Directorate of Intelligence of Cuba, founded on June 6, 1961, and the main foreign intelligence service of the Cuban state. The entity, which also operates under the aliases DGI and G2, is now blocked under the CUBA-EO14404 program, with all its assets frozen under U.S. jurisdiction and transactions with individuals or entities from the U.S. prohibited.
In addition to the new designations, OFAC updated the existing entries for the Ministerio del Interior (MININT) and the Policía Nacional Revolucionaria (PNR), adding the CUBA-EO14404 program to their previous sanctions under the Global Magnitsky program. PNR officials Oscar Alejandro Callejas Valcarce and Eddy Manuel Sierra Arias received the same update.
This is the second wave of individual sanctions against the regime in less than two weeks. On May 7, the State Department implemented the first designations under EO 14404, which included GAESA, the military conglomerate that controls over 70% of Cuba's dollarized economy.
The cadence of the sanctions suggests that the Trump administration maintains a policy of graduated and sustained pressure against the Cuban leadership, with EO 14404 serving as a central tool to expand the scope of restrictions beyond the traditional framework of the embargo.
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