The World Wants the U.S. to End Its Blockade on Cuba

November 12, 2018 "Information Clearing House" -  Last week, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to condemn the U.S. embargo against Cuba. 189 member-nations of the world said that Cuba does not deserve this embargo, which began in 1961 and has continued—unabated—to this day. Only two countries—the United States and Israel—voted against the motion. No country abstained.

Cuba’s minister for foreign affairs, Bruno Eduardo Rodríguez Parrilla, said that the U.S. embargo has cost the small socialist island state upwards of $933.678 billion, with the losses in the past year amounting to $4.3 billion (twice the amount of foreign direct investment into the island). This embargo, Rodríguez Parrilla said as he put the resolution forward, is an “act of genocide” against the island and its people.

The Group of 77 and the Non-Aligned Movement—both important groupings of the Global South—as well as regional groupings from Africa to Latin America backed the resolution. China’s representative to the UN, Ma Zhaoxu, made the case that the U.S. embargo on Cuba prevented the island from meeting its obligations to the UN Sustainable Development Goals.