President Danilo Medina from Dominican Republic, President Raul Castro from Cuba and President Nicolas Maduro from Venezuela during a homage to Chavez in La Havana.
These past few weeks, tensions between the United States government and several Latin American countries have been increasingly developing. On February 12, 2019, The Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Cuba issued a statement, condemning the pressures and actions taken by the US government in Venezuela.
Between February 6 and 10, 2019, military transport aircrafts landed in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Curacao. Prior to these events, it had been revealed by the media and political figures that John Bolton, US National Security Advisor, Mauricio Claver-Carone, Director of the National Security Council’s Office of Western Hemisphere Affairs as well as Marco Rubio, Florida US Senator, are actively organizing a coup d’etat in Venezuela supporting Juan , head of the opposition-controlled Venezuelan National Assembly. The Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Cuba decided to publish a statement, breaking down the situation in Venezuela and their response to it.
“What is at stake today in Venezuela is the sovereignty and dignity of Latin America and the Caribbean and the people of the South. Equally at stake is the survival of the rules of International Law and the UN Charter. What is being defined today is whether the legitimacy of a government emanates from the express and sovereign will of its people or from the recognition of foreign powers”.
The main message in the Cuban statement revolves around the solidarity of Latin America against the US government’s actions in Venezuela. For them, the United States is using a humanitarian pretext that is “one thousand times inferior as compared to the economic damages provoked by the siege imposed from Washington”, as a ploy to launch a military aggression in Venezuela.
The Cuban government condemns the US’ strengthening of their economic measures against Venezuela, including the blocking of their funds in third countries banks, worth billions of dollars and the sanctions on the Venezuelan oil market. Indeed on January 28, in an effort to punish President Maduro for human rights violations, the Treasury Department of the United States banned US companies from doing business with Petroleos de Venezuela, shutting them out of the American market. In their statement, The Revolutionary Government accused the US government of “causing grave humanitarian damages and harsh deprivations to its people”.
For the government of Cuba, “it is obvious that the United Nations is paving the way to forcibly establish a ‘humanitarian corridor’ under ‘international supervision’, (…) and take ‘all necessary steps’”. The statement compared the situation in Venezuela to the prelude of the wars in Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya.
As a response to the actions made by the US government, Cuba wants to protect the current state of Venezuela and its government through the Montevideo Mechanism, the initiative presented by Mexico, Uruguay, the Caribbean Commonwealth and Bolivia, which ultimately wants no interference from external states on matters of “internal affairs of States, legal equality of States and the peaceful resolution of conflicts”. The Cuban government shows an unwavering support to President Nicolas Maduro Moros as well as the Bolivarian and Chavista Revolution and wants a joint opposition from Latin America and the Caribbean against new military interventions in those countries and member states.
