Cuba’s top diplomat has told Newsweek his government is striving to reorganize its economy in order to combat an array of challenges facing the communist-led Caribbean island nation.
Yet he stood firm on Havana’s refusal to capitulate in the face of the world’s longest running trade embargo being mounted by the United States.
In a wide-ranging interview conducted on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla outlined a troubling state of global affairs, exacerbated by international conflicts, climate change and economic uncertainty. And while the Cold War that once placed Cuba at the forefront of nuclear brinkmanship has long passed, he argued that the nation continued to directly suffer the effects of a U.S. sanctions campaign first launched more than six decades ago.
Eased under former President Barack Obama and subsequently harshened under former President Donald Trump, the U.S. embargo has largely held throughout the administration of President Joe Biden, who has opted to retain much of his predecessor’s most restrictive measures. With Biden soon set to depart as a contentious U.S. election looms, Rodríguez Parrilla saw a missed opportunity to reset ties and attract U.S. investment in Cuba.
Today, however, as Cuba faces a growing list of shortages that now includes water, food and fuel, he asserted that the priority was mitigating the damage posed by sanctions. This would be carried out both through boosting alternative partnerships, including with China, as well as pushing forward with domestic reforms, such as the ongoing expansion of private small and medium-sized businesses nationwide.
Rodríguez Parrilla asserted that Cuba stood ready to adopt any and all necessary changes to its present system in order to improve the outlook of the nation and its people. However, he emphasized that such efforts would continue to diverge from what he described as the “backward vision” outlined for the country by policies he accused Washington of still trying to impose on Havana.
The following transcript has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla at a news conference in Havana on September 12. He says Cuba is ready to change, but not to submit to the U.S.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla at a news conference in Havana on September 12. He says Cuba is ready to change, but not to submit to the U.S.
ADALBERTO ROQUE/AFP/Getty Images
Newsweek: It appears now that U.S. foreign policy is largely focused on the ongoing wars in Gaza and Ukraine as well as great power competition with China, leaving issues related to Cuba somewhat overshadowed. How is this affecting the current dynamic of U.S.-Cuba relations, and do you see any potential for change in the upcoming presidential election?
Rodríguez Parrilla: I do believe that the international system is dysfunctional and must be changed. There is a historical accumulation that will force people to produce a new international order, a different security structure as well another international financial architecture. The U.N. should be deeply reformed and, at the same time, preserved from unilateralism.
After the Summit of the Future on Monday, the future seems to be ever more uncertain. Omissions in its declaration are excessive. The genocide that is being committed in Gaza is one example. The genocide in Gaza would not be possible without the financial support of the United States government and American arms and ammunition are being used in the Gaza genocide. The war in Ukraine has become a war with NATO. There is a major concern and alarm, because these may lead to a regional confrontation and even a global confrontation. Certain leaders have referred to the possible use of nuclear weapons.
There is no effective measure to protect humankind against climate change or to observe the 1.5-degree deadline. The form of production that prevails in the world is irrational and unsustainable. The external debt is a decisive factor that prevents any progress being made in the confrontation against climate change. And, curiously enough, the industrialized countries refuse to invest in their own prosperity and sustainability. Their best investment would be to invest in the mitigation and adaptation of developing countries.
Cuba is a small island but at the same time it’s a moral symbol and it raises a major international solidarity as well as sympathies among the U.S. population. It is no threat against anyone much less for the U.S. It has a significant presence of medical cooperation in as many as 56 countries, Haiti included, despite our serious economic situation.
So, within that context, we are very closely following what is going on in other countries. Whatever the outcome of the U.S. elections, this would be accompanied by the unswerving position of Cuba of preserving our independence, our sovereignty and constitutional order, while we are fully open to a serious and responsible dialogue, based on sovereign equality, mutual respect and reciprocal benefit. We are ready today and we will be equally after January 20.
One of the most compelling symbols of the argument for lifting U.S. sanctions has been the annual U.N. vote to do so backed by nearly every other country in the world. But if there is this crisis in confidence in the ability of the U.N. to effect change, even in large-scale conflicts, what other tools does Cuba have in its arsenal to actually fight this policy?
There is a crisis in confidence of the Security Council of the U.N., which has been generated by the abuse of the veto power of the U.S. as well as the very existence of the veto power that generates a paralysis at the Security Council. The U.N. cannot but reflect the imbalances of the international community.
But we should not underestimate the power of the General Assembly, which is representation of the voice and the vote of all the countries that are members of the U.N. When we are speaking about the reaction of the market, we are speaking about the reaction of the big financial elites. When we are speaking about the international public opinion or the international community, we are necessarily referring to the General Assembly. So, this is a very powerful message from a political point of view. It is very important from the point of view of international law. It reflects the democratic view of the world toward Cuba. And it is an essential message from the ethical point of view.
We cannot underestimate the accumulation of the debates at the General Assembly throughout the years. It is quicker to resort to coercive measures than to follow the procedures that are demanded by the General Assembly. So, I believe that what is going to happen on October 30 is going to be very important for the policy of the U.S.
The U.S. media is not always objective and deals with topics that are also important such as this. But there is an avoidable accumulation. We can see that on the faces of the U.S. diplomats. They are obviously refusing to defend a policy that they do not share, which only brings about discredit and isolation for the U.S. government.
An American classic drives past the U.S. Embassy in Havana. Its chargé d’affaires was summoned to the Cuban Foreign Ministry over accusations of “interfering conduct.” Washington denied involvement in protests against blackouts and food shortages…
An American classic drives past the U.S. Embassy in Havana. Its chargé d’affaires was summoned to the Cuban Foreign Ministry over accusations of “interfering conduct.” Washington denied involvement in protests against blackouts and food shortages in Santiago de Cuba, on March 18.
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YAMIL LAGE/AFP/Getty Images
If the U.S. continues down this path and maintains this embargo or even expands it as we have seen in the recent past, does Cuba have options to offset the costs of sanctions through the development of partnerships with other countries?
We understand that we should overcome the effects of the blockade on our economy and avoid the serious humanitarian damages it causes based on our own efforts and using our own resources. We must find a much more efficient economic model and adapt it to our current reality. And we’re working hard in this direction.
We also have some comparative advantages. We have a highly skilled labor force as a result of the high level of education acquired by the people. We have a powerful indigenous culture, a majority social consensus, a social and infrastructure work that is very tangible, that has been built for more than 60 years, the largest reserves of nickel in the world, and something much more important, which is cobalt. We have important resources in our maritime shelf, as well as many friends all over the world.
And it’s obvious that we have also developed a broad pattern of international relations based on the lack of relations that we have with the U.S. And, Mr. O’Connor, this is so much so that the main efforts of the U.S. government are aimed at forcing the extraterritorial application of its blockade policy against Cuba, ensuring the jurisdiction of its courts in an extraterritorial and illegal manner, ensuring the prevalence of their laws beyond their borders, preventing Cuba’s economic and multifaceted relations, not only with the U.S., but with any other country in the world.
The presence of Cuba on the list of so-called state sponsors of terrorism is unjustifiable. This was a decision adopted by the former Republican administration nine days before the inauguration of the new government. The current government could reverse that injustice even before or after November 5. The pretexts used to justify that policy have lost all credibility. However, they bring about considerable humanitarian damage. From the 1960s, there has been a host of pretexts. I do not know if ChatGPT could have the capacity to find them all. But the pretexts resorted to in the past few years have evaporated.
What’s more, recently there have been more futuristic sagas as the so-called sonic attacks against U.S. diplomats in Havana. Such operations as well as slanders generate undesirable consequences later on. If my memory serves me right, there have been more than 500 attacks reported not only all over the world, but also within the very premises of the White House.
The pretext was demolished by science, with the participation of Cuban scientists, American scientists, Canadian and also European scientists. But this was the pretext used to apply more than 200 measures deliberately designed to bring about humanitarian damage. So, the pretext exists no more, but the sanctions exist, as well as the humanitarian damages.
We have been able to make progress in our developments thanks to the cultural, academic, scientific and economic relations that we keep with all the countries of the world. Western Europe and China are important economic partners of Cuba. The American businesspeople could also be the same if not for this policy. During better times, the American farmers have taken advantage of a license that had violated the internationally standard commercial rules, and it was possible for Cuba to import as much as $1 billion in foodstuffs. These figures today are very small. We could retake those figures if they happen to be mutually beneficial.
There was a year in which as many as 600,000 American visitors arrived in Cuba. You are not allowed to go as tourists to Cuba. But now, in addition to that, you are not allowed to travel on an individual basis to Cuba. You must travel under a license in groups and under the surveillance and the scrutiny of the U.S. government and have to be told where you can accommodate yourself if you travel to Cuba and to which restaurants you cannot go and to which ones you can go.
But the most interesting things is that almost half of the Americans visiting Cuba accommodate themselves at small hostels and resort to small private businesses. And this ban on individual travel has led to all these people going into bankruptcy. What could be the logic behind the fact that the U.S. government is taking steps damaging the emerging private sector in Cuba?
And, meanwhile, they publish measures that are inapplicable because the oppressive, intimidating effect of the blockade makes it impossible for the owners of small and medium enterprises in Cuba to open a bank account in the U.S.
U-turn operations [transactions in which U.S. banks can process U.S. dollar payments involving Cuba that begin and end outside of the U.S.] could not be done before, not even now, because of these measures. And thinking about the possibility of a small Cuban farmer to be able to export directly to the U.S., I mean, this does not happen anywhere in the world.
A man prepares to unload water from a plastic drum from his horse-drawn cart in Havana, on September 24. Water scarcity has become the latest issue to rock the island amid shortages in food, medicine…
A man prepares to unload water from a plastic drum from his horse-drawn cart in Havana, on September 24. Water scarcity has become the latest issue to rock the island amid shortages in food, medicine and fuel.
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YAMIL LAGE/AFP/Getty Images
Some of Cuba’s international relations have been cast in a negative light by the U.S. In terms of China, there were reports of an alleged spy base being built in Cuba that once again came to light this year with apparent satellite imagery. Are there any grounds to these allegations and what is the value of the Cuba-China relationship more broadly?
Were you able to study the images? Because I have seen very funny images. Last year there was this F-16 plane that had an incident over the Carolinas. Well, this became a trendy topic in U.S. media networks. It was said that once the pilot had bailed out, Cuba had managed to take control of the F-16 and force it to land on a Chinese air base on the outskirts of Havana. It is nothing serious.
It is, indeed, serious that we have a respectful relationship, a mutually beneficial relationship with China and that we have every right to do so. We would like to have the same kind of relationship with the U.S. Chinese companies have recently entered Cuba. Whatever prevents American companies from doing the same is the blockade.
So, the U.S. government wants to compete with China at the global scale. But they follow a policy leaving Cuba free from this competition on high-tech procedures and technology. Why don’t they compete in Cuba as well?
All the more so, if they are so concerned about the geographical proximity, so is the case for our relations with Russia or other countries, well, unbelievably, the U.S. keeps a military base in Guantánamo. We do not quite well know what this base is good for, but this is an obstacle in our bilateral relations. Sometimes, they engage in a sort of show of force. But we have followed a very prudent policy. We will exercise our sovereign rights, and we will do nothing, nor will we allow others to do anything on Cuban territory that could be felt by Americans as a threat.
We would like to see some reciprocity. We would like to see the ceasing of the groups based in Florida receiving financing from the federal government or from entities very close to the government of the U.S. in order to prop up groups perpetrating terrorist actions in Cuba, or which pay persons in Cuba to create acts of violence.
The relationship with Russia was also in the spotlight this summer when Russian warships arrived in Havana. At a time when, as you said, NATO and Russia are effectively engaged in a war with one another, what message should the U.S. take from this visit and how important is Cuba’s relationship with Russia, including in terms of security and defense?
I believe that the U.S. government should take these actions in a very natural manner based on its own behavior. It has more than 800 military bases all over the planet. They have warships and bombers present in the oceans of all latitudes, including Guantánamo Bay. Its military doctrine has been increasingly aggressive. So, I don’t see why this should be a sign of alarm.
And referring to the presence of Russian warships in Cuban ports, we know these are brief visits for exchange. The biggest number of vessels visiting Cuba in the last few decades have been from countries that are members of NATO. And, of course, the presence of the most recent Russian naval unit in Havana harbor offered a sort of contrast and this was like an expression of a paradox. The area of the Havana harbor filled with tourist cruisers, most of them from the U.S., was now occupied by a Russian naval unit, as well as by a Canadian naval unit. They were together there.
Earlier, you mentioned the need to find a more efficient economic model to adapt to Cuba’s current reality and this includes the expansion of private initiatives as well as some recent social reforms, all of which may not be widely covered abroad. But at this challenging time for the Cuban economy, are these plans bearing fruit for the nation?
We hope so. It is a need for our economy, and they are part of the design of our model. And these are not overnight measures. They are the result of a previous process.
Curiously enough, very little attention was paid outside Cuba to the major development of agriculture production in the hands of private producers, and this has been so for decades. I’m referring to individual farmers or cooperatives. However, the medium and small enterprises have called great attention.
We do not have any legislation or any design for the creation of private small and medium sized enterprises, not even the creation of public small and medium sized enterprises. The entrepreneurial system in Cuba is unique. I mean, you do not legislate for public as separate from private enterprises. Some of the actions taken by the U.S. government intend to separate private small and medium sized enterprises from the rest of the Cuban economy and I don’t think this will lead to any results.
It is, in fact, an international experience and there are very good examples in Cuba of the way in which either public or private small and medium sized enterprises have achieved very good results. For example, in the area of technology, in the development of software and applications, the Cuban biopharmaceutical industry or the genetic engineering industry are competitive in the world. They are among the best on the planet. They have produced some technologies that do not exist in the U.S. They manufactured better COVID vaccines as compared to the American vaccines, and this has been shown according to the immunization data.
There are small windows requiring specific licenses in order to carry out joint work on a couple of Cuban scientific results or technologies. It would be very possible to do that on a broader scale. But today the factor that determines the condition of the Cuban economy is the tightening of the blockade. This coincides over time.
The Cuban economy was doing much better before 2019 as compared to the current situation. The coercive measures implemented by the Republican government were designed to bring about these results. There has been a pandemic. There is a global economic crisis. There are wars and conflicts seriously affecting the supply chains and have increased the costs of goods and services as well as freights and insurances, and particularly fuel and foodstuffs.
If you look at what the situation is like in other latitudes and countries that are not under a tightened blockade or maximum pressure policy, you will find many problems as well, blackouts in Ecuador, for example, the increasing poverty levels in Argentina. So, there are common circumstances. But what is absolutely peculiar is the tightening of the blockade.
I continue to believe that the Cuban economy is fully viable. This became obvious during difficult periods like the 1960s and the 1980s, and recovery is much more troublesome and much slower due to these additional sanctions imposed by the Republican government. And, to our surprise, these were fully implemented by the current Democratic government.
A worker hangs laminated cedar sheets for drying before they are used to wrap and preserve cigars at the privately owned MSME “Laminados Concepción,” located in Cabaiguán city, Sancti Spiritus province, Cuba, on July 25.
A worker hangs laminated cedar sheets for drying before they are used to wrap and preserve cigars at the privately owned MSME “Laminados Concepción,” located in Cabaiguán city, Sancti Spiritus province, Cuba, on July 25.
YAMIL LAGE/AFP/Getty Images
In responding to these sanctions and other external measures that exacerbate the challenges the Cuban economy is facing right now, how far is Cuba willing to go in pursuing reforms while preserving the current system of governance, or is this, too, up for debate?
In everything that might be necessary, within the limits of our national culture and based on the predetermination of our people, based on the full exercise of our sovereignty and our independence, whatever needs to be changed will most certainly be changed.
But the main issue is not about changing, but rather in what direction are we going to change? There are certain codes, semantic detonators, as some have called them, in the midst of these moral and cognitive crises in the world today in which people are focused on their mobiles, mixing reality with the virtual world, or are open to believe any sort of lie, or, worse than that, people lose their capacity for critical thinking or to think by themselves.
But some of these triggers is the word change. If you stand on the corner Lexington and 38th Street and you ask people, “Do you want to change?” I’m sure almost everybody will tell you, “Yes.” But if you ask them, “What is that change and how?”, you will see opinions totally different from one person to another.
We want to change to develop the common well-being, to strengthen our social policies, to achieve a much more efficient economy reflected not only in the macroeconomic data but also in the everyday life of people, for the good of the people, for the good of their prosperity and for their family’s prosperity that will allow young people to realize their dreams and plans for life.
We are speaking about realistic changes. It would be nonsensical for us to intend to have the consumption level of an American citizen that is not part of the minorities with a high level of qualification and with a permanent, safe and well-paid job. Of course, this person will have a much higher consumption capacity as compared to an ordinary citizen of Cuba, or Haiti.
But we hope for changes that will lead to us to a proud level of collective prosperity in which spiritual goods will be as good as material goods. And, of course, the fact of having a favorable international juncture will help this process a lot, because the vision of the U.S. government about change in Cuba is not only interventionist, it’s as if we were intending to make a socialist revolution in America. It is a very backward vision.
You realize that this is a vision oriented to reverse Cuba back to capitalism, to depending on underdeveloped capitalism supported by military dictatorships such as the one that existed before 1959. This vision is oriented to the purpose of the U.S. to recover their control, domination and sovereignty over Cuba. They intend to recover their banks, their latifundia [plantation-like agricultural estates], their railway system, their mining companies, their telephone companies.
Second Cuban official: Their casinos.
Rodríguez Parrilla: [Laughs] A Las Vegas senator told me once, “I feel grateful toward the Cuban Revolution, because without the Cuban Revolution Las Vegas would be in Havana.”
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Publish date : 2024-09-26 05:00:00
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