14ymedio, Madrid, 11 March 2024 — Of all the measures of the “criminal blockade” systematically denounced by the Cuban regime, the one that most annoys Cuba’s deputy director for the United States, Johana Tablada, is the “disinformation campaign about Cuba’s medical cooperation,” which she considers ignoble. The official has made a list of all the “pretexts” and “falsehoods” that Washington alleges in order to harm the Government of Havana, among which is the recruitment of Cuban mercenaries to fight with Russia in Ukraine.
“It is absolutely false and has been denied, just like the accusation of the Chinese bases that The Wall Street Journal publishes every week with total impunity and without attachment to any evidence,” she says bluntly in an interview published this Saturday by Prensa Latina. In Tablada’s opinion, Washington’s objective continues to be “to apply that crooked logic that if the blockade is tightened it will finally provoke a situation of revolt, a destabilization of our population, in order to blame the Government of Cuba for the impact of their measures.”
In Tablada’s opinion, Washington’s goal continues to be “to apply that crooked logic that if the blockade is tightened it will finally provoke a situation of revolt, a destabilization of our population, in order to blame the Government of Cuba”
The official eludes any self-criticism and emphasizes that the decisions of the US Government cause “a very severe, very painful impact on the standard of living of the Cuban family that today sees itself affected by the basic basket [of the rationing system], transport prices and the possibility of eating the food they need. Their idea is that this is because Cuba is a failed state; that is the narrative that is repeated,” she insists.
Last October, Tablada offered an interview to The Hill media in which she emphasized that the removal of Cuba from the list of states that sponsor terrorism is one of her priorities. “As we know, it is not just another slander; it’s a measure that goes directly to the jugular of the Cuban economy,” she says, but the meetings have not borne fruit for the moment, and Joe Biden’s Administration has maintained the Island’s status. The official’s words to Prensa Latina make clear her disappointment with the Democrats and even her indifference to a change of government in the neighboring country in November.
“The policy of Joe Biden’s government has essentially followed the policy of the Donald Trump government,” she says, “even with the electoral promise that those inhumane measures that affected the Cuban family were going to be lifted.” The regime visibly supported the Democratic Party during the 2020 elections, whose headliner (Biden-Harris) had claimed that they would alleviate some measures against Cuba taken by its predecessor.
A few months after those elections, now with Biden in the White House, the repression against the demonstrators of 11 July 2021 mass protests across the island put an end to any initiative to resume the thaw, and the relaxations have been much less than those predicted by the Cuban Government, which dreamed of a return to the times of Barack Obama.
“In 2024, there is still the possibility of a second term for President Biden,” says Tablada, “but I also predict that in January 2025, what I call ’President Trump’s demolition team’ will return. This is a country that is very polarized, where almost fascist forces are emerging, and even barbaric values that are anti-civilization such as racism, xenophobia and discrimination have become fashionable,” she elaborates.
Tablada has also referred to Republican representatives from Florida, specifically María Elvira Salazar – whom she accuses of wanting to perpetuate the presence of Cuba on the list of states that sponsor terrorism – and other opponents whom she does not mention but clearly alludes to.
“[There is a] permanent deception with the issue of human rights in which the United States Government grants privileged treatment to those people who have been the target and recipients of their financing projects for their intervention programs in Cuba’s internal policy. Those individuals are later presented as the heroes that they are not, because they have no support in our society,” she says.
“[There is a] permanent deception with the issue of human rights in which the Government of the United States grants privileged treatment to those people who have been the target or recipients of their financing projects”
According to Tablada, favoring those people “who do not even live in Cuba, is intended to justify the permanent and real violation of the human rights of millions of Cubans.” The official states that this economic suffocation is forcing the massive emigration of Cubans, without referring to the visa exemption policy maintained by Nicaragua – promoting exits at the request of Havana – or the more or less forced exits that the Government has promoted for opponents and other critics.
“The largest migratory wave in the history of Cuba, which has been very unfortunate for the Cuban family (…) is the result of that insensitive irrational policy, disconnected from reality, of thinking that by depriving people of sustenance, by cutting off all sources of income for the Cuban economy, it will manage to derail a process like ours of independence and sovereignty,” she insists. At the same time, she points out that this policy, implemented since 1959, has not worked.
Tablada’s message is repetitive throughout the interview, in which she warns that a report is being prepared that gathers the data of the fines “applied by the Department of Commerce to Cuban partners, in which it will be seen that “they have broken the record of previous years.”
Among the areas affected by the US measures, those that “affected the capacity of States to fight against COVID-19” stand out, without specifying what exactly she was referring to, but also the most recent decisions in the academic sphere. She insists that there are “growing calls” for the restoration of relations from economic, scientific and political sectors, and she adds that the meetings she continues to attend with American officials despite everything are a sign of Cuba’s goodwill.
Tablada says that “the people of Cuba trust much more in their very great solidarity, in the decency and decorum of those institutions”
“In 2023, it is no secret to anyone that even though the toughest measures that affect the lives of Cuban men and women have been maintained, certain spaces of cooperation and exchange with the Government of the United States have been restored, in total agreement with the aspirations of their people to live in peace with their closest neighbor,” she says, after accusing Washington of using a logic “in which I do everything I can to suffocate your economy and at the same time finance a permanent and systematic disinformation campaign with billions of dollars to hold the victims responsible for the impact of those measures.”
In the midst of a situation aggravated by energy shortages, lack of food and an increase in prices of various supplies, including the fuel that warms the Island’s spirits, Tablada affirms that “the people of Cuba trust much more in their very great solidarity, in the decency and decorum of those institutions that will always extend their hand to a country that, like few others, has been reaching out to help everyone who has needed it.”
Translated by Regina Anavy
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