Cuba accuses US of ‘genocide’ amid humanitarian crisis and Trump threats

Cuba’s government has accused the US of orchestrating a “genocide”, months after Donald Trump first threatened to focus on the country once the Iran war had ended.

Cuba has been temporarily thrown deeper into darkness during an island-wide power outage sparked by the total collapse of the country’s national electricity grid, when the White House increased pressure on Cuba’s communist regime with an executive order on January 29 that cut off the island’s critical energy supplies. The collapse marked the latest blow to a nation crumbling under the impacts of severe energy, fuel and medicine shortages, which Cuban authorities mostly blame on the United States.

Amid the crisis, Cuban bakers now work 24-hour-straight shifts followed by a single day off, while doctors struggle to travel to overwhelmed hospitals on unreliable public transport services. The situation has been further aggravated by US President Donald Trump’s series of harsh restrictions, according to global health and human rights researchers assessing their impact.

On June 19, the Cuban regime approved the largest package of reforms since former president Fidel Castro came to power in 1959, granting the possibility of privatisation in several key sectors in a bid to revive the economy. The Human Rights Watch researcher said Cuba’s reform package could be a sign the regime recognised a need for change in response to pressure from the US, “in order for them to be able to provide some access to basic services to their population”.