The Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla turned the expulsion of a Cuban diplomat from the United States into an institutional celebration this Monday, by posting on X that the employees of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MINREX) welcomed Richard Tur de la Concepción with honors at the ministry's headquarters in Havana.
Rodríguez Parrilla described Tur as someone who was a "victim of the disrespectful and provocative attitude of the United States delegation" during the UN General Assembly debate on the embargo, and he characterized his behavior as "firm and brave," presenting it as an "example for Revolutionary Diplomacy, the heir of Fidel and Roa."
The images from the event show about 40 to 50 people gathered in the lobby of the institutional building, with Tur himself speaking into a microphone next to a national flag.
This reception at the MINREX headquarters follows the one that took place days earlier at the José Martí International Airport, where First Deputy Minister Gerardo Peñalver Portal awaited him along with about ten officials from the ministry.
The origin of the incident dates back to October 27, when Tur attempted to snatch the phone from the spokesperson for Ambassador Mike Waltz, J.P. Freire, and struck at him several times while he was recording a confrontation in the hallways of the UN during the annual debate on the embargo.
Meanwhile, Rodríguez Parrilla left his seat and physically approached the podium where Waltz was speaking, forcing the President of the General Assembly, Khalilur Rahman, to briefly suspend the session.
That same night, Secretary of State Marco Rubio signed the expulsion order. Waltz announced on television that Tur "would be on a plane to Havana within the next 24 hours," and warned: "If you lay a hand on an American here in the United States, President Trump, Secretary Rubio, and I will not tolerate it."
On October 29, the State Department confirmed that Tur had left U.S. territory.
Far from acknowledging the severity of the incident, the Cuban regime turned it into propaganda. Peñalver Portal went so far as to claim that it was all a maneuver by Washington "to sabotage the vote on the resolution against the genocidal blockade and Richard Tur's candidacy for an important UN body."
However, the actual consequences contradict that triumphant narrative. The Foundation for Human Rights in Cuba (FHRC) added Tur to its list of Cuban repressors following the scandal.
Her candidacy for the United Nations Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ) for the 2027-2029 term is at stake, with the vote scheduled for this November.
And the annual resolution against the embargo, which in 2024 received 187 votes in favor, dropped this year to only 130, with 17 against and 25 abstentions: the worst historical result for Cuba in that vote.
Investigations by Martí Noticias also revealed that Tur's father, Ricardo Tur Novo, operated under diplomatic cover in Bolivia, Paraguay, and Jamaica as an officer of the Cuban MII Intelligence Department, using the alias "Roger."
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