The Cuban Foreign Ministry has blocked the embassy from importing the fuel, writes “Washington Post”. The diplomatic mission “shamelessly” claims a privilege for itself the USA denied to the Cuban people, the newspaper quoted from a translated version of the protest letter.

The approximately ten million residents of the socialist-governed island state have suffered from mismanagement, corruption and a trade embargo from the USA for decades. The ongoing economic crisis has brought Cuba to the brink of economic collapse, the infrastructure is dilapidated, the electricity network is outdated – which is why those who can are arming themselves with generators against recurring power outages. This obviously also includes the staff of the US Embassy in the capital Havana.

Crisis has worsened under Trump

Relations between the United States and Cuba have been strained since the revolution under Fidel Castro’s leadership in 1959 and have worsened since the inauguration of President Donald Trump worsened again. The Republican has largely cut off the island’s access to oil since December by issuing tariff threats against suppliers and putting a stop to imports from Cuba’s South American sister state Venezuela. However, the authoritarian country is dependent on oil for its electricity supply.

According to the Washington Post, fuel containers shipped from the United States to Cuba for the U.S. Embassy were detained by authorities there after arriving at the port of Mariel on Tuesday. The next day, the state representation reported to Washington that it would have to reduce its staff in the coming weeks if the blockade continued. The newspaper reported, citing an anonymous source, that embassy employees were already being accommodated in groups instead of individual accommodation and were being encouraged to work from home in order to save energy.