The United States has imposed sanctions on Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and several of his family members, escalating pressure on Havana as relations between the two countries remain strained.
The US Treasury Department said on Thursday that Díaz-Canel, 66, was added to a key sanctions list, allowing any assets under US jurisdiction to be frozen and generally prohibiting US citizens and companies from conducting business with him.
The sanctions also target Díaz-Canel's wife, Lis Cuesta Peraza, and his stepson, Manuel Anido Cuesta. In addition, the measures apply to Alejandro Castro and Raul Alejandro Castro, the son and grandson, respectively, of former Cuban president Raúl Castro, a powerful figure in the island's ruling establishment.
The move marks the latest effort by US President Donald Trump's administration to increase pressure on Cuba's government. Trump has repeatedly raised the prospect of bringing the economically struggling Caribbean nation under greater US influence.
Díaz-Canel has been Cuba's president since 2018, succeeding his political mentor Raúl Castro after rising through the ranks of the Communist Party. During his presidency, Cuba has faced one of its worst economic crises since the 1959 revolution, with recurring power outages and widespread shortages of basic goods.
Díaz-Canel: Sanctions are 'illegitimate'
Díaz-Canel called the sanctions "illegitimate," saying they aim to reinforce the embargo and make a conflict between Havana and Washington more likely. The Cuban president went on to say his country would resist the "imperialist onslaught."
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez also condemned the sanctions, saying they were "the latest example of an interventionist strategy by the US aimed at portraying Cuba as a threat to US national security."
The US also imposed sanctions on Cuba's Defence Ministry, the Communist government's Committees for the Defence of the Revolution (CDR), which are local monitoring groups that also report counterrevolutionary activities, and several other entities. Critics of the Cuban government say the CDR, which operate in nearly every neighbourhood, function as a tool for monitoring political dissent.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio defended the measures, writing on X that Cuba had for decades been "the world capital for radical left-wing terrorism." He said Washington was targeting the network that had enabled and financed what he called Cuba's subversive operations abroad.
Relations between Washington and Havana have been tense for decades. Tensions have increased further under Trump, whose administration has introduced additional sanctions and tightened restrictions on Cuba's oil supplies in an effort to force economic and political change on the island.
