Speaking before the General Assembly, Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Elio Rodriguez noted that the use of these provisions affects efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals as well as national development plans.
He stressed that unilateral coercive measures prevent access to international markets on an equal footing, in a fair and comprehensive manner.
The Vice Chancellor rejected the economic and trade blockade imposed by Washington on his country, which is considered the harshest and longest system of unilateral coercive measures ever applied against any country.
He said it was a deliberate act of economic warfare aimed at preventing financial income from the country, destroying the government’s ability to meet the needs of the population, collapsing the economy and creating a state of ungovernability.
He stressed that the blockade constitutes a gross, blatant and systematic violation of the human rights of all Cubans, and calls for an almost unanimous rejection by the international community, recalling that 80 percent of the Cuban population was born under the influence of that policy.
He warned that Washington’s policy of strangulation has been further strengthened by the arbitrary inclusion of Cuba in the State Department’s unilateral list of countries alleged to sponsor terrorism.
He added: “This classification has no basis, authority, or international support, to attempt to justify and tighten the blockade imposed on Cuba, through which the United States continues to punish the Cuban people.”
The Cuban representative believes that it is not enough to acknowledge that Cuba is fully cooperating with the United States in combating this scourge, as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has acknowledged, but rather the island must be removed from that false list without further delay.
Rodriguez spoke in relation to the discussion held by the General Assembly to end unilateral extraterritorial coercive measures used as a tool of political coercion, which he described as timely.
He pointed out that the complete, immediate and unconditional abolition of such measures constitutes a historical demand of the international community, which was reflected in the resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly and the Human Rights Council, as well as in many declarations.
The Deputy Minister thanked the displays of international solidarity in confronting the blockade in North America while ensuring that the Caribbean country does not abandon its social justice system despite the restrictions imposed.
“We will remain a fully independent and sovereign nation, master of our own destiny. It is a conquest achieved through the sacrifices of many generations, and we will always defend it,” he added.
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