The Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused the Cuban regime this Thursday of having built and maintained a vast network of intelligence and ideology that helped to establish the extreme left in the United States and the Western Hemisphere, and that remains actively connected to radical groups both inside and outside of the West.
He said it during his speech at the Ministerial Conference on the Resurgence of Political Terrorism, held this Thursday at the State Department in Washington D.C.
The conference brought together representatives from more than 70 countries from Europe, Latin America, and Asia, including India, Indonesia, and Singapore, called together by the Trump administration to reframe the Western counterterrorism strategy in response to the threat of the extreme left.
"The extensive intelligence and ideology network of the Cuban regime helped build the extreme left in our country and in our hemisphere, and remains inextricably linked to extreme left groups and movements both within and beyond the West," Rubio stated before the delegates.
The secretary also noted that Iranian proxy networks are "increasingly closely linked to leftist militant groups around the world," and described Antifa militants as a transnational network that travels between Europe and the Americas to engage in coordinated attacks, share propaganda materials, and finance operations through encrypted channels.
Rubio argued that Western counterterrorism has had a "blind spot" for decades regarding the political violence of the radical left, while jihadist threats received all the attention.
To support his thesis, he cited that between 1970 and 1980, 93% of the terrorist attacks in the West came from the extreme left.
Currently, extreme left violence in Germany has increased by more than 40% in the past year, and in Greece, more than 80% of radical violence is carried out by extreme left and anarchist actors.
As a historical background, he recalled the training of "tens of thousands of Marxist guerrillas in Castro's terrorist camps," along with the actions of groups such as the FARC, ELN, the Tupamaros, and Montoneros in Latin America, and the Italian Red Brigades or the German Red Army Faction in Europe.
Rubio announced that the Trump administration will continue to expand its anti-terrorism strategy: there will be new designations of far-left groups as foreign terrorist organizations, and the next counter-terrorism workshop will be co-organized with Germany.
"We either cooperate across our borders or the terrorists will continue to exploit the gaps between them," the Secretary of State warned.
The speech occurs in the context of a sustained escalation of sanctions from Washington against Havana.
On July 13, just three days before the conference, the U.S. imposed an eighth round of sanctions against 10 additional Cuban entities, including the Rapid Response Brigades and the Ministry of Tourism. In June, Rubio had already sanctioned the MINFAR, the ICAP, and the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution.
The Cuban regime rejected the conference before it even started. Chancellor Bruno Rodríguez labeled it as "McCarthyite" and based on "lies," and advised Rubio to "read history."
Vice Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío described it as a "smokescreen" to hide the unfavorable electoral climate for Republicans. China also came to Cuba's defense on Wednesday, criticizing the sanctions imposed by Washington just days earlier.
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