Cuba has confirmed it is in contact with the United States, but a senior diplomat said the exchanges remain limited and have not yet turned into formal talks, even as tensions between the two countries rise.
Cuba and the United States are in contact, a senior Cuban diplomat said on Monday, though he stressed that the exchanges have not yet developed into a formal dialogue.
Carlos Fernandez de Cossio, Cuba’s deputy foreign minister, told Reuters that Washington was aware Havana was ready for “a serious, meaningful and responsible dialogue”. However, he said the current communication remained limited.
“We have had an exchange of messages, we have embassies, we have had communications, but we cannot say we have had a table of dialogue,” de Cossio said in an interview at the foreign ministry in Havana.
De Cossio’s remarks marked the first indication from Cuba that some level of communication is taking place, following renewed tensions between the two countries in January after the US captured Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, a close ally of Cuba.
Trump signals talks, threatens economic pressure
US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that the United States had begun talks with “the highest people in Cuba”, days after declaring the country an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US national security.
He also warned of tariffs on US-bound exports from any country supplying oil to the communist-run island. “I think we’re going to make a deal with Cuba,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Cuba had earlier denied holding talks with the United States.
Oil pressure and deepening crisis
Tensions have escalated in recent weeks as the US moved to block oil shipments to Cuba, including supplies from ally Venezuela. The restrictions have worsened fuel shortages, pushed up food and transport prices, and triggered prolonged blackouts, even in the capital Havana.
Trump said on Monday that Mexico would stop sending oil to Cuba as part of Washington’s pressure campaign.
Cuba questions sustainability of US strategy
De Cossio said he believed the US effort to halt fuel exports to Cuba would eventually prove unsustainable. He questioned whether Washington could realistically force all countries to comply with such restrictions in the long term.
Longstanding rivalry reaches critical point
The two neighbouring countries have remained at odds since Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution, but Cuba’s deepening economic crisis and stepped-up pressure from the Trump administration have recently pushed tensions to a critical point.
With inputs from Reuters.
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