The Biden administration released the Country Reports on Terrorism and continues Cuba's designation as a “state sponsor of terrorism”. The real purpose of slandering Cuba as a “terrorist” is to justify the illegal US blockade on Cuba.
With Cuba’s SSOT designation, the US. attempts to criminalize normalizing relations with Cuba, exacerbating the already devastating impacts of sanctions.
Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
On 27 February 2023, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carlos Fernández de Cossío, summoned the United States Chargé D’Affaires, Benjamin Ziff, to the Ministry, to formally convey Cuba’s vigorous protest at the granting of political asylum to the Cuban citizen Rubén Martínez Machado, perpetrator of the hijacking of a Cuban civil aircraft on 21 October 2022.