Cuban police arrest 24 people and confiscate homes, vehicles and 11 million pesos
14ymedio, Havana, December 13, 2025 –The Cuban authorities insist on accusing external forces of being behind the spread of drugs on the island. This time, they found the pretext in a police operation announced on Friday against an alleged network dedicated to producing and distributing el químico – the chemical – the synthetic cannabinoid that has become the drug of greatest impact among young Cubans.
According to official media, the criminal network is directed from Florida and employs residents on the island as distributors, a scheme that coincides with the recent official strategy of attributing the increase in consumption to “external influences.”
Arnaldo Ramos, section chief of the Specialized Criminal Investigation Unit of the Ministry of the Interior, stated on State television that the drugs, described as a cream-like mixture, entered Cuba through “illegal air parcel shipments” camouflaged in yogurt containers, gelatin, food supplements and medications. The official insisted that Havana has “accordingly” informed Washington about individuals in the US who allegedly try to promote trafficking on the island, although “there has been no response to these cases.”
According to official media, the alleged drug trafficking network is directed from Florida
The explanation exists in a context where the Government itself has had to recognize, for the first time in years, that consumption of synthetic drugs has diversified and expanded, particularly among adolescents and people in their twenties. The most recent reports speak of a growing market for variants of el químico made with imported substances and processed clandestinely in private homes, a phenomenon that authorities had kept silent about until very recently.
In the operation publicized this week, the head of the Anti-Drug Unit, Yoan Saporta, reported the arrest of 24 people charged with offenses related to drug trafficking. In addition to the drugs, authorities seized syringes, gloves, trays, masks and acetone, the latter considered one of the basic inputs for producing el químico. Houses, vehicles and 11 million pesos were also confiscated, a sum equivalent to $91,600 at the official exchange rate but barely more than $25,000 on the informal market.
The operation is presented as part of the “zero tolerance policy” reiterated by senior government officials in early December, when they denied that Cuba is a producing or transit country for narcotics. The official speech coincides with the reinforced US military deployment in the Caribbean to combat drug trafficking, which Havana links to geopolitical pressures on allied governments, especially that of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela.
As part of this hardline policy, the courts have multiplied the “show trials,” a practice that the official media has frequently publicized over the past year. In one of the most recent cases, a young man was sentenced to 15 years in prison for possession and sale of small quantities of illicit substances, a punishment that is contrary to international standards and reveals the punitive hardening supported by the new Penal Code, which establishes sentences ranging from 4 to 30 years, life imprisonment and even the death penalty.
Although authorities have belatedly acknowledged the rise in drug use, they do not hesitate to crack down on independent journalists who investigate cases outside official channels. The Ministry of the Interior insists on presenting each operation as a decisive blow against drug trafficking, while the expansion of synthetic drugs exposes a reality that is less controlled than official discourse admits.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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