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The U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, asserted this Thursday that President Donald Trump seeks "a new future for the Cuban people with greater freedom and economic and political opportunities," while justifying the new sanctions imposed against the state-owned company Cuba-Petróleo (CUPET).
In a message posted on his official account on X, Rubio presented the measures not only as an action against the economic structure of the regime but also as part of a strategy aimed at weakening the mechanisms that sustain repression and political control on the island.
"President Trump desires a new future for the Cuban people with greater freedom and economic and political opportunities. Until then, we will continue to undermine the communist regime's ability to use its energy trade to promote its corrupt agenda and violently repress the Cuban people," he stated.
The head of U.S. diplomacy accompanied his statements with sharp criticism of the Cuban government's management of energy resources, accusing it of using fuel for the benefit of the ruling elite while millions of citizens suffer from blackouts and shortages.
"Cuban communist elites have instrumentalized energy as a tool for social control and kleptocratic profit," wrote Rubio.
According to the Secretary of State, for years the regime has allocated fuel to maintain the privileges of the ruling elite, the security forces, and other activities related to the political apparatus, while the population confronts a severe energy crisis.
"They have stolen and hoarded the available fuel, using it for the private plane of the Castros, for the security forces employed to repress the Cuban people, to keep empty tourist hotels lit, and to transport people on buses for fake protests and political maneuvers," he stated.
Rubio added that these practices occurred "while the Cuban people endured blackouts and waited weeks to fill their car tanks."
The statements come amidst a critical situation for the island. Cuba is experiencing one of the worst energy crises in its recent history, with prolonged power outages affecting millions of people and increasing difficulties in ensuring fuel supply.
The sanction against CUPET is part of the measures adopted by the Trump administration under Executive Order 14404, aimed at increasing economic pressure on the structures deemed essential for the support of the Cuban regime.
The decision also comes just a day after the State Department denied having authorized a commercial operation that would have allowed the shipment of large volumes of American fuel to Cuba through facilities controlled by CUPET.
Vanguard Energy, a company based in Coral Gables, Florida, had signed a contract with a Cuban importing agency to lease CUPET facilities and send over 250,000 barrels of gasoline and diesel per trip, in what was described as the largest shipment of American fuel to Cuba since the Eisenhower era.
With his message this Thursday, Rubio sought to place the new measures within a broader narrative: one of a policy aimed, as he stated, not against the Cuban citizens, but against the economic and political structures that support the regime.
The statement further reinforces the signals sent by Washington in recent weeks regarding the continuation of a pressure strategy against the main sources of income of the Cuban government and its state-owned enterprises.
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