Cuba's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bruno Rodríguez, denounced on Tuesday the tightening of the economic, commercial, and financial blockade by the United States against his country during the COVID-19 pandemic.
United Nations.- In a tweet, the foreign minister pointed out that the U.S. government decided to maintain its criminal policies amid the fight against the disease, which is why he described Washington's siege as a virus.
According to Cuban authorities, Donald Trump's administration imposed 243 unilateral coercive measures to suffocate the Cuban economy, of which 55 were implemented during the international health emergency.
Despite the overwhelming international community rejection and the calls from the United Nations to eliminate all provisions that limit the ability of States to deal with the pandemic, Joe Biden's administration keeps Trump's measures in force.
In particular, during the scourge of COVID-19, the White House deliberately hindered the import of necessary supplies, as illustrated by the refusal of the U.S. Department of Transportation to the requests of some airlines to operate flights to Cuba with humanitarian cargo.
The report adds that, due to the tightening of the blockade, the German companies Sartorius and Merck and Cytiva and other suppliers of laboratory material, reagents and supplies, stopped their shipments to Cuba in 2020.
In total, the island could not access 32 equipment and supplies related to the production of its vaccine candidates against COVID-19 or the execution of stages of clinical studies; among this equipment for the purification, filtration tanks, and capsules, thimerosal, bags, and reagents.
UNESCO RELEASES REPORT ON THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE U.S. BLOCKADE ON CUBA
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) issued a report Tuesday on the consequences of the U.S. blockade against Cuba.
The Paris-based multilateral organization provided elements on the consequences of Washington's blockade for the report prepared by the UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, given a new vote slated for Wednesday in the General Assembly on a draft resolution calling for a halt of the hostile measure.
According to UNESCO, the U.S. policy harms the implementation on the island of important transformations aimed at perfecting its education system, among them the modernization of the curriculum and actions to raise the efficiency and quality of the teaching process.
This updating involves the use of laboratory materials and equipment, as well as new texts, whose access and printing, respectively, are made more expensive by the blockade, UNESCO stressed in the document that provides inputs to the Secretary-General's report requested by the Assembly in 2019, when 187 of the 193 UN member states supported the initiative.
Also, in higher education, accessing technology and supplies is limited, while the impossibility of free academic exchange and cooperation between universities and research institutions in Cuba and the United States affects what would be a highly beneficial exchange for scientific knowledge, it added.
In the cultural sector, UNESCO pointed out to the Secretary-General that the siege hits the promotion and dissemination of artistic talent, which is illustrated with the difficulties faced by Cuban musicians in taking advantage of the U.S. market. (RHC)
