China injects billions of dollars into Cuba

Havana strongly rejected reports in US media on Thursday that claimed China had penned a deal worth several billion dollars with Cuba to place a signals intelligence base on the island, which sits roughly 100 miles south of Florida.

Ever since it overthrew a pro-US dictatorship in 1959, the USA has sought to sabotage the Cuban socialist revolution, driving Havana into the arms of Moscow and more recently Beijing.

The sanctions blockade has made everyday life on the island a struggle, with 243 new sanctions introduced in the last six years.

The US media report was based on the words of US officials familiar with highly classified intelligence, who claimed the intel was convincing.

Carlos de Cossio, Cuba’s Vice-Minister of Foreign Relations, called the report totally false and unfounded information.

Such slanders have been fabricated by US officials apparently familiar with intelligence information, such as those regarding alleged acoustic attacks against US diplomatic personnel, referring to the mythical Havana Syndrome, which was dis-proven by multiple investigations, including eventually one by the US State Department.

All are fallacies promoted with the perfidious intention of justifying the unprecedented intensification of the blockade, destabilization and aggression against Cuba and to deceive the public opinion of the United States and the world.

The hostility of the USA against Cuba and the extreme and cruel measures that cause humanitarian damage and punish the Cuban people cannot be justified in any way.

The fury came swiftly from Republicans, who rushed to condemn US President Joe Biden for supposedly neglecting the threat posed by Cuba.

After Biden took office in 2021, he maintained the 243 coercive sanctions against Cuba that were added by his predecessor, Donald Trump, as a major reversal in policy from the rapprochement seen when Barack Obama was US president.

Following protests in the country in the summer of 2021 that were supported by the USA, Biden added even more sanctions, refusing to lower them either in response to the COVID-19 crisis or when a catastrophic fire broke out at the country’s main oil offloading facility the following year.

Earlier this year, relations began to warm ever so slightly, with the US embassy in Havana hosting several cultural exchange events with the Cuban government and relaunching its visa and consular services after a years-long pause.

US Rep. Carlos Gimenez (R-FL), a Cuban-born US lawmaker who represents the congressional district closest to Cuba, told the White House that the action poses an imminent threat to the USA and a direct threat to his constituents and to tourists in the region.

The Castro regime in Cuba is a listed State Sponsor of Terrorism that actively pursues opportunities to undermine the United States and threaten the safety & well-being of our citizens.

Allowing Communist China to establish a base in Cuba is only the latest example of the Castro regime’s long history of coercive, anti-American pursuits, the letter said.

He added that Communist China is proactively undermining the USA across the Western Hemisphere and I urge this Administration to build a robust, comprehensive, and expedient strategy to counter the CCP’s [Chinese Communist Party, also CPC] malign influence with neighboring states.

The USA has a military prison facility in Cuba at Guantanamo Bay, which it operates without Havana’s permission, and has a ring of bases surrounding China in Korea, Japan, and the Philippines, and has turned the island of Taiwan – a Chinese province in rebellion – into a pro-US garrison state.

The US Navy routinely flies spy planes just miles off the Chinese coast, including signals intelligence aircraft engaged in the same kind of peeping that the alleged Cuba base would perform.

Cuba was placed on the State Department’s list of state sponsors of terrorism in January 2021 as then-US President Donald Trump was preparing to leave office.

The justification was a refusal by Havana to surrender leaders of the Colombian National Liberation Army (ELN) who had traveled there in good faith for peace talks with the Colombian government in 2019.

When Bogota launched a new surprise attack on the ELN bases during the talks, the delegates stayed in Cuba for safety reasons.

The State Department has made no announcement about the impact of the reported Havana-Beijing deal on Blinken’s schedule.

Sputnik / ABC Flash Point News 2023.