Mr President,
Cuba has been unable to receive any fuel supplies, which it urgently needs. The reason is the energy blockade imposed by the Government of the United States since January 30.
By preventing Cuba from receiving oil, the United States seeks to paralyze our hospitals, schools, universities and factories, public transportation, water supply, gas stations, the electricity system, and food production.
They do not hide that the purpose is to create a humanitarian crisis and provoke social unrest leading to the overthrow of the constitutional order freely decided by the Cuban people in several referendums.
There is no political, ideological or economic reason that can justify depriving a people of their means of livelihood and sustainability.
That is not foreign policy or national security. It is cruelty and barbarism. It is a flagrant and massive violation of the human rights of an entire people.
Millions of Cubans must endure daily power outages for many hours.
I denounce that in Cuba there are children, elderly people and patients who die prematurely because the blockade prevents them from receiving their medicines and treatments.
Under the current energy restrictions, the surgical waiting list in the country exceeds 96,000 patients, including more than 11,000 children.
Care is hindered for 32,000 pregnant women who require diagnostic ultrasounds. More than 30,000 children have not been able to receive their vaccines in a timely manner due to the shortage of refrigerated transport caused by the lack of fuel.
Treatment is affected for 16,000 patients undergoing radiotherapy and another 2,888 who depend on hemodialysis, services that require stable energy supply.
In Cuba, the care of every child is defended as the most valuable treasure. Our country had achieved an 80 percent survival rate in childhood cancer. As a result of the tightening of the blockade, it has decreased to 65 percent.
The infant mortality rate, after years of remaining below 5 per thousand live births, now stands at 9.9.
Behind every figure there are names and faces of innocent children and devastated families. Do Cuban children not deserve to live?
As the High Commissioner rightly stated regarding the siege against Cuba: “Nothing can justify the suffocation of an entire population.”
Mr. President,
Cuba has been subjected to the longest genocide in history, for the sole reason of not submitting to the dictates of a foreign power 90 miles from its shores.
Our people suffer a modern form of medieval siege, to encircle until surrender through hunger and disease.
The suffering of an entire people cannot be normalized. One cannot remain silent in the face of such abuses. The blockade is a crime and silence is complicity.
Cuba does not beg; it demands justice. The blockade kills and must end.
I thank you