Cuba: Demonstration against the embargo in front of the American embassy

Several hundred thousand Cubans, led by former President Raul Castro, marched in front of the United States embassy in Havana on Friday to demand an end to the American embargo, one month before Donald Trump's return to the White House.

Under the slogan “March of the people fighting against the blockade and the presence of Cuba on the list of countries supporting terrorism”, the demonstrators marched in front of the representation located on the coastal avenue of the Malecon.

“We are marching to tell the United States government to let the Cuban people live in peace!” declared Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel to the crowd waving Cuban flags.

“We are not terrorists”

The revolutionary leader and former president Raul Castro (2006-2021), 93 years old, led the demonstration alongside the head of state. “Lift the blockade!”, “We are not terrorists, remove us from the list” chanted the demonstrators.

According to authorities, 700,000 people marched, a figure that AFP has not been able to independently verify.

“We want the blockade to end […] we need the doors to open so that we can trade with all countries,” Rogelio Savigne, 55, a transport manager at a state-owned company, told AFP. “If we did not have the blockade, the difficulties we are experiencing would not be so great,” said Faustino Miranda, 85 years old.

“Deprived of food, medicine, fuel”

Cuba is going through its worst economic crisis in thirty years, with shortages of all kinds, chronic power cuts, and an unprecedented wave of emigration.

“When financial transactions are targeted and prevented […] the Cuban people are deprived of food, medicine, fuel, goods, supplies and merchandise essential to their survival,” denounced Miguel Diaz-Canel.

During his first term (2017-2021), Donald Trump, who will be inaugurated on January 20, stopped the historic rapprochement that the two countries began ten years ago under the mandate of Barack Obama.

The year 2024 “was one of the most difficult”

The Republican implemented 243 measures strengthening the embargo in force since 1962, including the re-inscription of the communist island on the American list of “countries supporting terrorism”, including in particular Iran and North Korea.

His Democratic successor, Joe Biden, has barely relaxed these measures and kept Cuba on the blacklist, which hampers financial and trade flows to the island. Miguel Diaz-Canel stressed in the morning that the year 2024 “was one of the most difficult” for Cuba which lives “day to day”.

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