Shoman: The US Has Issued a Death Threat to Cuba

Cuba is facing a growing crisis, and according to US President Donald Trump, the Cuban government is failing. This comes after increased pressure from the Trump administration. Shortly after U.S. forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in January, President Donald Trump shifted focus to Cuba, declaring a national emergency and calling the Cuban government an “unusual and extraordinary threat” for allegedly hosting Russian spies and welcoming groups like Hamas and Hezbollah. U.S. sanctions have blocked oil shipments to Cuba, worsening energy shortages on the island. Earlier this month, Prime Minister John Briceño, said the government stands in full solidarity with the Cuban people, adding that reduced oil supplies could trigger a manufactured humanitarian disaster in the country. Echoing the PM’s sentiment today is former minister of Foreign Affairs, Assad Shoman. Shoman says if the US succeeds in its mission, people in Cuba will die.

 

Assad Shoman, Former Minister of Foreign Affairs

“The whole purpose of their threat against Cuba, their sanctions, so called sanctions. It is not an sanction. It is an evil act that is done to people because you are sanctioned because you did something wrong. No, they have not done anything wrong. They are just being punished by the United States unduly, irrational and illegally. All of that is done in order to make the people suffer so much that they will overthrow the government. So the purpose the clearly to make the people suffer but they want them to suffer that they will overthrow the government. That’s terrorism. Absolutely, under any kind of definition. So that is a policy that they have continued. That is a policy that has been condemned by the United Nations over thirty times in the last few years. It started in the 1990s. The UN resolutions. So that has been condemned by the United Nations many times. All their European allies condemn them. So if that is to be condemned, what do you think about this? This additional thing which amounts to a death threat, Hipolito. That is what the United States is doing now. It has issued a death threat against Cuba, against the people of Cuba. That is a death threat. If that succeeds, and obviously they want it to succeed people in Cuba will die.”

 

Hipolito Novelo

“Do you think that the US, Donald Trump, is wrong when he says that Cuba is a threat.”

 

Assad Shoman

“He is absolutely wrong. There is no question about that or that Cuba is a terrorist state or anything like that. These are things that are made up. In fact, I have something here from the UN experts, a panel of UN experts on human rights. They issued a declaration on the twelfth of February when they said that characterizing Cuba as an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security of the US lacks credibility and appears designed to justify the use of extraordinary and coercive powers. There is no thread of evidence that they even tried to present to show that Cuba is a terrorist state.”

 

Belize Should Send Aid to Cuba, Shoman Says

 

Trump’s order threatened heavy tariffs on countries that continue sending oil to Cuba. With U.S. sanctions already cutting off Venezuelan oil, the warning was aimed at Cuba’s other key supplier, Mexico, putting Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum in a tough spot between supporting Cuba and responding to U.S. pressure. Mexico has sent humanitarian aid, and Canada is considering doing the same. So, what about Belize and CARICOM? The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, is in the Caribbean to meet with leaders during CARICOM’s fiftieth Heads of Government. Shoman says regional leaders will be too scared to condemn the US.

 

Assad Shoman, Former Minister of Foreign Affairs

“They have no right to do this. This is illegal. It has been condemned by the United Nations and the reaction has been, in Belize, our prime minister called it out. Remember the House Meeting when the President of Guayana was here and he said that was wrong. Our Leader of the Opposition has condemned it, Tracy Panton. I don’t know if you carried her statement she gave out a week or so and today I noticed she put up another post because she realized this thing is getting out of hand. The leaders of the Caribbean remain silent. And not only that, they invite one of the architects of this murderous, criminal, policy, to come to the fiftieth meeting of the Heads of Government of CARICOM to address them.”

 

Hipolito Novelo

“Mexico halted its shipment of oil to Cuba. It did, however, sent humanitarian aid. I believe Canada is thinking about sending humanitarian aid. Should Belize send.”

 

Assad Shoman

“Absolutely, I am hoping against hope because as I have said, they have been silent. Except, you know, Briceno was not been silent. I think he is the only one who has spoken out, the only actual leader that I know of that has spoken out against what is happening in Cuba today. But, former leaders have done so. Obviously, I don’t except the CRICOM to make any statement condemning the United States for this. They are all afraid. But let us up that the least they would do is do what you just suggested: send a shipment of humanitarian aid to Cuba. People are dying. People are suffering. People who are our brothers and sisters. They are part of our region. They have been an intimate part of our development of our region all along.”

 

Shoman’s says his comments on this issue is as a private citizen and not as an agent or representative of the government of Belize.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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