The Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío published a response on his social media this Monday to the State Department's report titled “Cuba: the Capital of 21st Century Communism,” labeling it as “voluminous and false.”
In an extensive post on Facebook, the diplomat also accused Washington of trying to "instill fear among American citizens about a supposed threat from Cuba."
The document, published on July 20 under the direction of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, accuses the Cuban regime of having developed for more than six decades networks of espionage, ideological subversion, and influence operations against the U.S., with connections to Russia, China, and Iran, and mentions specific cases such as Ana Belén Montes, Víctor Manuel Rocha, and the Avispa network.
Cossío did not refute any of those cases nor provided evidence that contradicted the accusations. Instead, he resorted to the argument that the report omitted the historical context.
In that regard, it was noted that when mentioning the admiration of American civil rights fighters for Cuba, the document made "no mention of the serious injustices committed in that country that led so many people from various backgrounds to become involved in a national political and civil battle."
Regarding Cuba's support for armed movements in Africa, the deputy foreign minister argued that the report "omits reference to the yoke of colonialism and the oppression of the racist regimes of South Africa and former Rhodesia, whose survival for so long was associated with the political, economic, and military backing of the U.S. and other major powers."
Cossío also denounced what he called a "double standard": the report criticizes Cuban intelligence actions in the U.S. without mentioning U.S. operations against Cuba, and without acknowledging "the right to legitimate defense that a country has under constant aggression from the world's greatest military and nuclear power."
The argument ignores that documented cases of Cuban espionage —such as that of Ana Belén Montes, who spent years leaking intelligence secrets to Havana— are not defensive responses, but rather offensive operations against a sovereign state.
What the Deputy Foreign Minister omits in his response is as revealing as what he says: no mention of the more than 700 political prisoners that Rubio demanded to be released on July 18, no reference to the humanitarian crisis facing the island, and no acknowledgment of the systematic violations of human rights documented in the report itself.
This Sunday, Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla also weighed in, calling the notion that Cuba represents a threat to the U.S. a “ridiculous and foolish lie” and accused Rubio of fabricating a pretext to justify sanctions and a potential military aggression.
Rodríguez Parrilla went so far as to describe the sanctions as "current genocide" against the Cuban people, a term that the regime systematically uses to evade its own responsibility for the island's economic collapse.
Cossío's response falls within a sustained pattern of verbal confrontation with Rubio throughout 2026: in May, he accused him of lying "repeatedly," and in June, he described the sanctions as "collective punishment."
However, in a surprising rhetorical turn, the vice chancellor recently stated to the New York Times that the Cuban regime does not rule out Trump or his organization for doing business on the island.
Rubio presented the report stating that Cuba has been, for more than six decades, "the primary sponsor of leftist radicalism and third-worldism" in the U.S. and the hemisphere, as part of a maximum pressure policy that includes over 240 sanctions and the re-designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.
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