Cuba denounced before the United Nations (UN) Security Council the double standard of the U.S., by designating the Government of Venezuela as a foreign terrorist organization. “What moral standing does the U.S. Government have for these designations, when it protects and finances terrorist organizations on its territory, refuses to collaborate with neighboring countries like Cuba on terrorism matters, and openly speaks of covert actions and CIA sabotage against Venezuelan infrastructure,” emphasized the island’s representative in the forum, Ernesto Soberón Guzmán. The diplomat categorized the measure against Caracas as “arbitrary, fraudulent, unilateral, and politically motivated”. On the other hand, he considered that “it is hypocritical that the country with the main drug market in the world, from whose territory this criminal business is financed, promotes a war to supposedly combat that scourge in Latin America and the Caribbean”.
Impact on the island
The pronouncement was made at a meeting of the Security Council in which the harassment of the Donald Trump Administration against Venezuela was debated. Regarding this, the Cuban representative pointed out that “the irresponsible actions of the United States government seem to have no limits”, as “it imposes the application of the law outside its territory and far from its coasts, where it has no jurisdiction, using the assault and appropriation of assets”. “The U.S. government disrespects and seriously violates international law, the regime established in the law of the sea, freedom of navigation and commerce, and the convention for the suppression of unlawful acts against the safety of maritime navigation,” he mentioned. Soberón indicated that Washington’s measures against Venezuela, which have included the seizure of oil tankers, also “negatively affect Cuba” and “re-intensify the policy of maximum pressure and economic asphyxiation.” In that sense, he mentioned that the actions have “a direct impact on the national energy system and, consequently, on the daily life” of the people.The New Strategy
Soberón also mentioned that the new U.S. National Security Strategy, “which includes the so-called Trump corollary of the Monroe Doctrine”, aims to “enforce the idea that the Western hemisphere is its exclusive zone of influence, validates the dangerous doctrine of peace through force and enshrines cognitive warfare as a State policy”. “The big stick policy and gunboat diplomacy, with their criminal record of aggressions and abuses against the peoples belong to the past of our region. We cannot allow it to be the future,” said the diplomat. In that same vein, it was pointed out that, therefore, with its actions, the current US government “transgresses the precepts of the proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a zone of peace”. “We reiterate the call to the international community to stop this escalation against a sovereign state,” the Cuban representative emphasized.Venezuela under siege by the US
- Since last August, the U.S. has maintained the largest military deployment of the last decades in the Caribbean waters, with sustained presence of naval and air assets. Initially, Washington justified this operation under the argument of the supposed fight against drug trafficking, holding the Government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro responsible, without presenting evidence, for contributing to that crime.
- With the passage of months, Washington’s official narrative has undergone a predictable turn. As the Venezuelan Government had denounced, the supposed focus on drug trafficking has given way to a discourse openly focused on the control and illegal appropriation of the energy resources of the South American country, in a context of increasing economic pressure and threats of the use of force. In recent weeks, the U.S. has seized at least two oil tankers, in an act described by Caracas as “robbery” and piracy”.
- The U.S. military operation has also had lethal consequences. More than 100 people have died as a result of more than twenty bombings against small boats in the Caribbean and Pacific waters, without the U.S. having publicly demonstrated the link of these with illicit activities.
- Faced with these actions, Caracas announced that it will go this Tuesday to the Security Council of the United Nations Organization (UN) to denounce what it calls military aggressions by the U.S. and a violation of international law.
- From Russia, they have repeatedly expressed their support for the South American nation and have called for full respect for international law. Thus, the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, in a telephone conversation held at the beginning of December with his Venezuelan counterpart, expressed his “solidarity with the Venezuelan people” and “reaffirmed his support for the course of the Government” of Maduro, “aimed at defending national interests and sovereignty in conditions of increasing external pressure.” He also stressed that Venezuela “deserves absolute respect in its legitimate struggle for the defense of its sovereignty and independence.
- China also repudiated any action that “infringes the sovereignty and security of other countries or constitutes unilateral acts of intimidation.”
- President Nicolás Maduro sent previously a letter to the member states of the United Nations, in which he warned about “an escalation of actions of extreme gravity by the US Government.” He warned that these operations threaten to destabilize the entire Caribbean region and the international system as a whole.
