President Trump’s new measures against Cuba preserve diplomatic relations and the right to most U.S. trade and group travel. But aggressive U.S. atmospherics risk hardening Cuba’s domestic politics and making it harder for Havana to play its mediating role in regional crises and conflicts.
Russian vessels docked in capital Havana.
Foreign Ministry 7 June announced four Russian vessels would “pay an official visit” to port in Havana 12-17 June, emphasising that none of them carried nuclear weapons and that “their stop-over in our country does not represent any threat to the region”. U.S. officials played down significance of their arrival, though U.S. submarine 13 June entered Guantanamo Bay in “routine port visit”; Canadian patrol vessel 14-17 June also conducted port visit to Havana. Reasons for visit remained unclear, though some noted actions came weeks after U.S. President Biden authorised limited use of U.S. weapons on Russian soil to defend Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, which prompted Russian President Putin 5 June to threaten “asymmetric response” (see Russia).
In the three posts below, the director of Crisis Group’s Latin America and Caribbean program, Javier Ciurlizza, and our vice president and special adviser on Latin America, Mark Schneider, look ahead to how the U.S. and Cuban moves could transform the wider region.
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