The Secretary of State Marco Rubio will travel to New York from September 20 to 23 to participate in the High-Level Week of the 81st General Assembly of the UN alongside President Donald Trump, as announced this Friday by the Department of State.
The president is scheduled to address the Assembly on September 23 as the second speaker of the morning session, after Brazil opens the meeting.
According to the official statement, the American delegation will bring to New York an agenda focused on "peace, prosperity, and the primacy of nations," with the aim of encouraging the multilateral organization to return to its central mandate of maintaining international peace and security while respecting the sovereignty of each state.
The State Department stated that Washington will use the week to work with other member countries "to achieve real results for the American people, building on the historic UN reforms achieved in the past year."
In addition to the plenary sessions, Rubio will hold bilateral meetings with foreign ministers from various countries to address shared priorities in security and economics. Among the anticipated meetings is one with Russian Foreign Minister Serguéi Lavrov, who had confirmed the contact days ago, with Ukraine and the bilateral relations between both powers being central topics.
The trip takes place at a time of intense pressure from Washington on Havana. A day before the announcement, Rubio had declared new sanctions against eight entities and three individuals linked to the Cuban military apparatus and the nickel sector.
That measure was added to those approved in early September, when the Trump administration increased restrictions against five Cuban state entities and a grandson of Raúl Castro, including the Banco Exterior de Cuba.
The strategy of the Trump administration has been described by Rubio himself as the closure of “every escape valve” for the Cuban regime, a policy that has intensified in the months leading up to the meeting in New York.
In July of last year, a leaked diplomatic cable revealed that Rubio had instructed U.S. embassies to pressure foreign governments ahead of a debate on Cuba at the UN, categorizing countries according to their expected positions. That debate concluded with 136 votes in favor of the resolution on the embargo.
The general debate of the UNGA 81 will take place from September 22 to 26 and on September 28, with the war in Ukraine, the situation in Gaza, international trade, and migration as the main focal points of the global agenda.
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