WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump on Friday signed an executive order expanding US sanctions against the Cuban government, two White House officials said. Reutersas he seeks to exert more pressure on Havana after ousting the Venezuelan leader.
The new sanctions target individuals, entities and affiliates that support the Cuban government’s security apparatus or are complicit in corruption or serious human rights violations, as well as government agents, officials or supporters, the officials said.
It is unclear who was sanctioned under the order, which was first reported by Reuters.
But a copy of the order released by the White House says the sanctions could apply to “any foreign person” operating in “the energy, defense and related materiel, metals and mining, financial services or security sector of the Cuban economy, or in any other sector of the Cuban economy.”
The order allows secondary penalties for conducting or facilitating transactions with individuals targeted by the order, officials said.
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel said the new “coercive” measures reinforce the “brutal and genocidal” US blockade against the island.
“The blockade and its strengthening are causing so much damage because of the intimidating and arrogant behavior of the world’s greatest military power,” Diaz-Canel wrote on social media.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said the sanctions measures, announced as the island traditionally celebrated May 1, were aimed at imposing “collective punishment on the Cuban people” and that Cubans would not be intimidated.
Increase pressure on the Cuban government
Jeremy Paner, a former sanctions investigator at the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, said the move was the most significant for non-U.S. companies since the U.S. embargo against Cuba began decades ago.
“Oil and gas companies, mining companies and banks that have carefully separated their operations in Cuba from those in the United States are no longer protected,” said Paner, who is now a partner at Hughes Hubbard & Reed, a law firm.
The new sanctions are the Trump administration’s latest attack on Cuba, which the president has repeatedly said is on the brink of collapse.
Under Trump, U.S. forces launched strikes on boats allegedly carrying drugs off the coast of Venezuela and traveled to Caracas to arrest President Nicolas Maduro. Trump said, without providing details, that “Cuba will be next.”
Officials said Trump’s order contained an implicit warning to Cuba, accusing the government in Havana of aligning with Iran and groups like Hezbollah.
“Cuba provides a permissive environment for hostile foreign intelligence, military and terrorist operations within 100 miles of the U.S. homeland,” one official said.
The United States has long demanded that Cuba open its state economy, pay reparations for properties expropriated by former leader Fidel Castro’s government and hold “free and fair” elections. Cuba has declared its socialist form of government non-negotiable.
The United States imposed additional sanctions and pressure on the island earlier this year, when it cut off Venezuelan oil exports to Cuba after ousting Maduro on January 3. Trump then threatened to impose punitive tariffs on any other country that sent crude to Cuba, prompting Mexico, another major supplier, to suspend shipments to the island.
Cuba’s fuel shortage has contributed to major nationwide power outages and prompted many foreign airlines to suspend flights to the island.
