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U.S. sanctions not only caused Cuba's humanitarian crisis — they are now disrupting aid shipments meant to alleviate it.

In an exclusive interview, United Nations Resident Coordinator in Cuba Francisco Pichón tells Belly of the Beast journalist Liz Oliva Fernández how sanctions are causing delays in the delivery of critical humanitarian aid.

Also this week:

“The Blockade Is Why My Family Left Cuba”
Supreme Court Deals Another Blow to Cuba
New Sanctions Target Banking, Mining, Steel
Doctors Respond to “Forced Labor” Accusations
As Washington Wages Economic War, Vietnam Invests

UN: Trump’s Sanctions Are Affecting Humanitarian Aid

Only 30% of Cuba’s essential medicines are available. Some 67,000 children are now at risk of missing routine vaccinations. Infant mortality has doubled.

As we documented in our film for Al Jazeera Health Under Sanction, the U.S. government's economic war on Cuba has decimated the island's healthcare system. It is now also blocking critical humanitarian aid meant to alleviate the crisis it caused.

According to UN Resident Coordinator in Cuba Francisco Pichón, $630,000 in aid from UNICEF has been delayed due to “logistical restrictions” related to U.S. sanctions. The aid includes emergency medical kits, supplies for newborns and nutrition support for pregnant women.

“We’re not only being affected by the restrictions themselves, but what we call over-compliance,” said Pichón.

Banks, insurers, shipping companies and logistics providers have become so afraid of violating U.S. sanctions that they often refuse to work with UN agencies trying to get humanitarian aid to Cuba. Even when shipments arrive, fuel shortages in Cuba generated by the U.S. oil blockade hamper aid distribution.

"This should not be happening," Pichón said.

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"The Blockade Is Why My Family Left Cuba"

For many Cuban families, the decision to leave the island is a consequence of the economic hardships created by decades of U.S. sanctions.

In our latest episode of U.S. Voices Against the Blockade, Daylín Marrero reflects on leaving Cuba at eight years old and why she returned years later as an activist.

“The reality is I left Cuba, my family left Cuba as a direct result of what the U.S. has done and has been doing for the past 65 years,” said Daylín. “It’s not for political reasons. It’s because of the U.S. blockade and blocking us from being able to access basic medicine and basic resources.”

Watch the interview with Daylín HERE.

Supreme Court Deals Another Blow to Cuba

In a 6-3 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court has opened another front in the Trump administration's economic war on Cuba, allowing Exxon to pursue more than $1 billion in claims against Cuban state-owned companies weeks after it allowed the heirs of a Nazi-linked businessman to sue cruise ship companies for having docked in Havana.

The Exxon lawsuit stems from 1960, when Cuba nationalized a refinery and more than 100 gas stations amid an escalating economic confrontation with the United States. After the Eisenhower administration blocked U.S. oil exports to Cuba, the Cuban government turned to the Soviet Union for crude. When the major oil companies operating on the island refused, following pressure from Washington, to refine the Soviet crude, Cuba nationalized their refineries.

The Court ruled that Exxon’s claims against Cuba’s state-owned companies CUPET and CIMEX are not blocked by sovereign immunity. Under that legal doctrine, foreign governments and the companies they own are generally shielded from lawsuits in U.S. courts.

The lawsuits became possible in 2019, when Donald Trump activated Title III of the Helms-Burton Act after every previous president since 1996, the year the law was passed, had suspended it. (For an inside look into the lobbying campaign that led to Title III’s activation, check out our article Billboards and Backchannels). The provision allows U.S. claimants whose property was nationalized during the Cuban Revolution to sue companies for doing business on that property.

In dissent, Justice Elena Kagan argued that the Helms-Burton Act did not grant plaintiffs the right to sue foreign states or state-run companies in U.S. courts.

“The first clue that Helms-Burton does not abrogate sovereign immunity is the statute’s language — which says not one word on the topic,” Kagan wrote.

The ruling follows on the heels of the Court's May Havana Docks decision, which found that four major cruise ship companies could be liable for hundreds of millions of dollars to the descendants of Sosthenes Behn, a telecommunications tycoon who was the first “representative of American finance” to meet with Adolf Hitler and "helped build up the Nazi war machine.”

For more on the history of Havana Docks and the Behn family, read Billboards and Backchannels.

New Sanctions Target Banking, Mining, Steel

The Trump administration piled more sanctions on key sectors of Cuba’s economy this week, targeting mining, steel production and banking.

Based on Trump’s May 1 executive order, the sanctions seek to stop Cuba from earning much-needed foreign currency. The sanctioned companies include:

Banco Financiero Internacional, the country's principal commercial bank for foreign transactions
Geominera, Cuba's state mining company and joint venture partner with Australia's Antilles Gold
Antillana de Acero, the country's largest steel producer
Almacenes Universales, a state-owned logistics company.

Doctors Respond to “Forced Labor” Accusations

Corporate media outlets regularly parrot U.S. government claims that Cuban doctors who volunteer to go on medical missions are subjected to “forced labor.” But they rarely take the time to talk to the doctors themselves while they serve on these missions.

We did.

Watch our latest video in which Cuban doctors in southern Italy respond to the U.S. government accusations that they are victims of "modern-day slavery."

And if you haven’t seen it yet, check out From Cuba to Calabria, our documentary about Cuba’s medical mission in Italy.

As Washington Wages Economic War, Vietnam Invests

While Washington tries to isolate Cuba from the rest of the world, Vietnam is taking the opposite approach.

During a visit to Havana this week, Vietnam’s Foreign Minister Le Hoai Trung met with Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel and other senior Cuban officials to discuss continued cooperation in food production and renewable energy, two sectors hit hard by U.S. sanctions.

Vietnam has supported rice production in Cuba for years and one joint project now covers more than 900 hectares.

Vietnam and Cuba have been close allies for more than six decades. In 1960, Cuba was the first country in the Western Hemisphere to establish diplomatic relations with Vietnam. In recent years, the Vietnamese government and its people have stepped up to help Cuba as it navigates a crisis largely brought about by U.S. sanctions. A Vietnamese fundraising campaign to support Cuba last year raised $21 million via two million donations.

While Vietnam and Cuba are governed by their respective Communist parties under single-party systems, U.S. policy toward each country could not be more different. While U.S. officials lecture Cuba on “democracy” and “human rights” to justify devastating sanctions and an oil blockade, Vietnam has become the United States’ eighth-largest trading partner and is considered a key strategic ally.

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