The Cuban-Barbadian Friendship Association is today reaffirming its solidarity with the government and people of Cuba in calling for the removal of the economic, financial and political United States blockade on the Caribbean island.
President of the Cuban-Barbadian Friendship Association David Denny is also calling on Heads of Governments in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to turn up the pressure on the Joe Biden administration to end the near 60-year trade embargo.
Denny’s comments came as protest action erupted in several cities across Cuba over the past several days, fueled by shortages of food and medicine, price hikes, a collapse of the economy and the government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Cuba’s President Miguel Díaz-Canel has blamed the situation facing the Caribbean country on the US embargo.
While the Barack Obama administration started to ease certain travel and trade policies towards Havana, former President Donald Trump reimposed those restrictions.
In an interview with Barbados TODAY on Thursday, Denny said it was about time that the restrictions against the Spanish-speaking nation were removed, suggesting that CARICOM and Havana could enjoy a deeper relationship once that was done.
“We would like CARICOM to repeat its call for the removal of the political embargo against Cuba. We would also like CARICOM governments to call on the Biden administration to remove the political embargo against a sister Caribbean nation,” stressed Denny.
“The embargo against Cuba is an embargo against the Caribbean region because many of our countries benefit from Cuba in the form of scholarships, eye care, medical care and also dealing now with the COVID-19 situation. We are all ready to accept the Cuban vaccine in our region,” he said.
He said his association was also working with other “progressive organisations” in Barbados including the Israel Lovell Foundation, the Pan-African Coalition of organisations, the Clement Payne Movement, and the 13th June 1980 Movement among others, to express solidarity with the people and government of Cuba in the form of a rally.
Denny said the rally will be hosted on July 24, next to the 1998 Cubana Monument in Paynes Bay, St James. The monument commemorates the October 1976 terrorist attack on the Cubana Airlines flight which left Barbados en route to Jamaica and then to Havana. Seventy-three passengers died in the crash.
Denny said it was simply the near six-decade political and economic embargo on the island by the US that was responsible for the current conditions facing the nation of roughly 11 million people.
“It is obvious that a country that is faced with an economic embargo will end up in a situation where they will have problems with food and medicine,” he said.
“The Cuban people will continue to defend their revolution because they know what the revolution is responsible for,” he added.
Denny said Cubans in Barbados wanted to be part of a process that stands in solidarity with the people of Cuba and which demands the removal of the economic and political embargo. (MM)
