14ymedio, Havana, 7 February 2022 — The ship Augusto C. Sandino is once again on its way to Cuba from Nicaragua with humanitarian aid. The ship, which set sail this Sunday from the river port of El Rama, carries 36 containers, 21 of which contain coffee and 15 of rice.
It is the fourth shipment that the Nicaraguan government has sent to Havana since last August, after the July 11 protests. That Sunday, thousands of Cubans took to the streets demanding freedom, but also food and medicine, in the midst of an economic crisis unprecedented since the 1990s.
The Sandino already made the same trip at the beginning of December, with a shipment of 50 containers, with a total weight of 1,007 tons, of coffee, beans and household goods. Before, in August and September, Managua had sent shipments of about 30 containers each.
The official press has touted this new donation, attributing responsibility for the economic crisis “to the intensification of the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed on the Island by the United States,” without mentioning that the Island buys large quantities of food and medicine from that country every year. In fact, the US is the main supplier of frozen chicken to Cuba.
The Nicaraguan government of Daniel Ortega, whose democratic deterioration has been condemned by the international community, including the United States and the UN, is thus consolidating itself as one of the main allies of the Cuban regime, as it was at the beginning of the Sandinista revolution, in the 1980s, when Fidel Castro sent troops and weapons to Managua.
Managua’s decision, last November, to establish “visa-free” entry for Cubans has been the spigot of the mass exodus that the Island is experiencing these days. Hundreds of Cubans take planes daily to Managua with the ultimate goal of reaching the United States by land.
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