On June 23 this year, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly once again voted on a resolution which condemns the blockade on Cuba as illegal and inhumane and calls on the United States (US) to lift the blockade and other nations to ignore it. Such resolutions have been presented to the UN on an annual basis since the 90s, and each time it is brought to the floor it has been overwhelmingly accepted by the member nations. In spite of this, the blockade against Cuba remains and has in fact been intensified over the past five years.
The illegal blockade of Cuba is 60 years old. It has spanned 2 – 3 generations robbing Cuba of billions of dollars and has cost the lives of people who have succumbed to things which could have been dealt with or dealt with better but for the blockade. It has forced the country to make do with obsolete material and placed it in a position of having to pay above and beyond market prices to access materials as companies are wary of engaging in trade with the island without a large guarantee, lest they be frozen out of the US markets through secondary sanctions.
What crimes have the Cuban people committed which have seen them suffer over 60 years of crippling sanctions and embargos? What grave action has this island, home to some 11 million people, done to deserve this treatment which, according to the UN, must only be used on pariah nations? The ‘crime’, as we all know, or should know, is that of wanting independence, seeking a path other than the US dominated imperialist one, and the promotion of solidarity through sharing the expertise of its doctors, engineers, and teachers. Cuba’s ‘crime’ ultimately is that it is a socialist nation, living proof that Socialism, rather than being the barbarous caricature drawn up by the west, is a humane endeavour with the real potential of uplifting nations.
jamaicachange 