The Russian-flagged, state-owned tanker the Anatoly Kolodkin departed March 8 from Primorsk, Russia, carrying 750,000 barrels of crude that, once refined, could provide Cuba with several precious weeks of energy.
The United States-imposed fuel crisis in Cuba is also turning into a waste and health crisis, as many collection trucks have been left with empty fuel tanks, causing refuse to pile up on the streets of the capital, Havana, and other cities and towns. Only 44 of Havana's 106 rubbish trucks have been able to keep operating due to the fuel shortages, slowing rubbish collection, as waste piles up on Havana's street corners, the Reuters news agency reported on Monday, citing state-run news outlet Cubadebate.
When Rosaly Estevez self-deported from Miami to Havana last November, US immigration officers bid farewell by removing her ankle monitor. The 32-year-old had been told she was about to be detained, so she left with her three-year-old son, Dylan, a US citizen. It's been brutal, said Estevez. Imagine Dylan hugging his phone every night when he sees his dad. I wouldn't wish this on any mother.
U.S. President Donald Trump has intensified the pressure against Cuba, targeting the island's most vulnerable point: its oil supply. After Venezuela halted its shipments, the White House issued an executive order declaring a national emergency with respect to Cuba and announcing tariffs on any countries that provide oil to the island. This move could affect Mexico's ability to resume its own oil shipments to Havana.
Cuba has long been under the effects of a perfect storm that shows no signs of abating. In addition to constant power outages, the high cost of living, persistent unsanitary conditions in the streets, and a tangled economic crisis that Cuban authorities seem incapable of resolving, there are now direct threats from Donald Trump's administration, aimed at the Castro regime which has been in power for nearly 70 years.
Rodriguez made this and other statements in an X post rejecting claims leveled by US President Donald Trump that Venezuela had been paying Cuba for security services. Rodriguez's post also underscored Cuba's right to purchase oil from whatever source it might choose after Trump on Saturday threatened to cut the island off from all money and oil because of his claims that Havana had helped Venezuela's ex-president, Nicolas Maduro.
Cuba, a major beneficiary of Venezuelan oil, has now been cut off from those shipments as U.S. forces continue to seize tankers in an effort to control the production, refining and global distribution of the country's oil products. Trump said on social media that Cuba long lived off Venezuelan oil and money and had offered security in return, "BUT NOT ANYMORE!"
When Nicolas Maduro and his wife were captured and taken out of Venezuela by U.S. military forces in the early hours of Saturday morning, a group of young Cubans were celebrating a birthday at a house in Havana's Vedado neighborhood. They were sharing music, jokes and drinks when the hostess noticed an alert on her phone. News of the U.S. strike on Caracas, part of the operation to capture the Venezuelan leader, sparked a conversation that dominated the rest of the evening.
