Havana/The Government of Cuba claims to have contacted the United States after the statement issued this Thursday by the State Department headed by Marco Rubio in which he communicated that his country was ready to provide aid to the Island after the passage of the Hurricane Melissa. “We are awaiting clarification on how and in what way they are willing to help,” the vice minister of Foreign Affairs stated in his X account. Carlos Fernández de Cossíoconfirming that he did so “as a result of today’s public communications.”
To this tweet, he commented Juan Antonio Fernández Palaciosthe island’s ambassador to the European Union: “No handouts or conditions. The international community has overwhelmingly said what they have to do. Nothing more to say.” The diplomat was referring to the vote before the UN on the resolution on the US embargo this Wednesday, which although the regime presents as a triumph got the worst result since it takes place, every year since 1992.
Fernández Palacios elaborated on this another comment: “Suspension of suffocation measures. Allow free flow of goods and services and financial transactions. Humanitarian pause. #TumbaElBloqueo.” For her part and in the same sense, Vice Foreign Minister Josefina Vidal added: “The moment of truth has arrived. We will be very attentive.”
“Suspension of suffocation measures. Allow free flow of goods and services and financial transactions. Humanitarian pause”
Hours before, the US Secretary of State emphasized in their networks the same thing he had expressed in the statement published on his agency’s official website: “The United States is prepared to provide immediate humanitarian assistance, both directly and through local partners who can distribute it more effectively to those who need it.”
In this text, published just one day after having left the Island off the list by assuring that his country was “in close contact with the Governments of Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas” due to the ravages of the cyclone and that American rescue teams were heading to the affected areas”, he showed his solidarity with “the brave Cuban people, who continue fighting to satisfy their basic needs” after the passage of the cyclone. “As in the neighboring countries of the Caribbean, the State Department issues a Declaration of Necessity Humanitarian for Cuba,” Rubio signed today.
The statement recalled that US law provides for “exemptions and authorizations for private donations of food, medicine and other humanitarian goods to Cuba, as well as for disaster response,” and encouraged “those who wish to directly support the Cuban people” to contact the State Department to resolve possible questions. In this regard, they asked that you contact the email address [email protected].
However, the secretary did not provide details of how this humanitarian aid would be coordinated with the Government of Havana. Martí News published, before Fernández de Cossío’s tweet became known, that Washington had not received any request for help on the part of the regime, but that he was “willing to help the Cuban people.”
Three years ago a petition with the same characteristics took place, after the passage of Hurricane Ian for the west of the Island. Then, the United States donated two million dollars “to the needy in Cuba” affected by that cyclone.
From Saudi Arabia, Manuel Marrero sent “a strong greeting to the entire country that has lived through very difficult hours.”
Meanwhile, from Saudi Arabia, Cuban Prime Minister Manuel Marrero sent “a strong greeting to the entire country that has experienced very difficult hours” and reported that the Saudi Government is willing to send “significant aid to contribute to the recovery of the damage caused by the hurricane.”
He realizes this this Thursday Granmawhich adds signs of solidarity from Colombia. Its president, Gustavo Petro, met with Marrero this Wednesday, also within the framework of the Future of Investment Initiative Forum held in Riyadh, and told him that “ships will immediately leave his country to support with rice, electrical transformers and other means to assist the recovery process.”
Hurricane Melissa, which has gone from category 5 to 2, is advancing towards Bermuda, where the situation is expected to worsen this Thursday night, reported the National Hurricane Center, after leaving a trail of destruction and fatalities, 32 in total (23 in Haiti, four in Jamaica and one in the Dominican Republic).
In Cuba, so far, no deaths have been reported, but Miguel Díaz-Canel, who last night accused those who wonder if there are fatalities of being “scavengers,” did not close the door on that possibility. “There may be someone deceased and we are going to report it with all honesty,” he assured, while launching into a diatribe against those who “are thinking or looking for an argument in the people’s pain to try to demoralize, to try to disunite, to try to discredit what this country has done with its heroic people.”
The Cuban president was in charge of a meeting of the National Defense Council, broadcast on the Mesa Redonda program, in which material damage was quantified. The preliminary evaluation was carried out province by province, despite the fact that there are still isolated mountain and rural areas.
This Thursday, Civil Defense ordered three of the six eastern provinces (Holguín, Las Tunas and Guantánamo) to move to the “recovery” phase, but keeps Santiago de Cuba and Granma on “alarm.”
The official organization explained that Holguín, Las Tunas and Guantánamo “do not present a complex hydrological situation and are in conditions for recovery.”
“The good work of the authorities, media and the population stands out for their discipline and solidarity during the preparation and response to the event,” adds the Civil Defense note, which agrees with a multitude of information that appeared in the provincial press about state troops mobilized in the east of the country to help return to normality.
By decree, the province of Camagüey is already in that “normality”, whose localities were on “alarm” since Monday.
The “information” phase is the first of four chronological stages that the Cuban authorities establish to face natural disasters, which is followed by the “alert” (when the cyclonic presence is expected in the next 48 hours), “alarm” (24 hours before) and “recovery”.
In the seven hours in which it was on the Island, Melissa left about 400 millimeters of water in six locations and 72 with more than 100. The waves reached six meters at the worst moments and the winds were devastating.
