The proposal calls for the release of political prisoners, sanctions against Díaz-Canel, and guarantees for the return of exiles.
EFE/14ymedio, Strasbourg, June 17, 2026 – The European Parliament will vote this Thursday on a resolution urging the European Union to suspend the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement with Cuba if the regime does not adopt concrete and significant measures toward full multiparty democracy in the short term.
The proposal, promoted by center-right groups, currently has the support of the European People’s Party, the European Conservatives and Reformists, and the liberals of Renew Europe. Together, the three groups have 343 Members of the European Parliament, 18 fewer than needed to achieve an absolute majority.
The text calls for a specific plan for a political transition, the immediate and unconditional release of nearly 1,300 political prisoners, and guarantees that exiled Cubans may return to the Island without suffering reprisals.
It also condemns the systematic repression of the Cuban regime, calls for sanctions against Miguel Díaz-Canel, and argues that the only way out of the country’s suffering, poverty, and isolation is through profound political and economic change leading, without further delay, to a democratic transition.
“The European Parliament has the opportunity to deliver another slap, but a real and powerful one, to put an end to the Cuban tyranny”
The approval of the resolution will depend to a large extent on Patriots for Europe, which has submitted several amendments to strengthen the language against Havana. The group has tied its final support to the acceptance of those modifications.
“The European Parliament has the opportunity to deliver another slap, but a real and powerful one, to put an end to the Cuban tyranny,” Jorge Buxadé, head of Vox’s delegation in the European Parliament, told EFE.
Buxadé warned that his party would not accept the European People’s Party once again “throwing itself into the arms of the progressives,” referring to possible negotiations with Social Democrats and Greens.
The absence of references to United States economic sanctions and restrictions on fuel supplies has prevented those two groups from joining the center-right text. Social Democrats and Greens have presented an alternative proposal that, in addition to denouncing repression and demanding the release of political prisoners, calls on Washington to end what they describe as “illegitimate practices” against Cuba.
The division over the role of the United States threatens to prevent a common position in the European Parliament
Social Democratic negotiator Leire Pajín stated that her group shares the condemnation of the political rights situation on the Island, the demand for economic and political reforms, and the call for respect for fundamental freedoms.
However, she argued that a resolution on Cuba’s severe humanitarian deterioration should include “all the reasons” that have contributed to the crisis.
Pajín mentioned the long-standing economic embargo and the recent measures by the Trump Administration against oil supplies to the Island, which, she said, have worsened blackouts and shortages of medicines and food.
The Socialist MEP also stressed that Washington’s measures have begun to directly affect European economic interests, after hotel chains such as Meliá Hotels International and Iberostar announced that they would cease operating some of their establishments in Cuba. “When that happens, we have to denounce the situation in all its elements from the beginning,” she maintained.
The division over the role of the United States thus threatens to prevent a common position in the European Parliament, despite the fact that the main groups agree in denouncing repression, calling for the release of political prisoners, and demanding profound reforms from the Cuban regime.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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