Madrid/Miguel Díaz-Canel walked this Wednesday in Beijing with the delegation of leaders who attended the Chinese military parade for the 80 years of the end of World War II. Despite the fact that the words friendship, political unity, mutual trust and narrow links are part of the diplomatic vocabulary that both nations are lavished constantly, the Cuban president only obtained a discreet fifth row in the group, headed by Xi Jinping, in the center, escorted by Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un.
After passing through Vietnamthe Cuban leader continues with an Asian tour – which ends at his next stop, in Laos – in the desperate search for prosperous allies with which to cushion the deep crisis that the country lives and that threatens to aggravate himself in the midst of the US government offensive against his greatest partner, Nicolás Maduro. The two eastern countries are a fundamental part of the Cuban economy and have become large exporters to the island, without having much to offer in return.
In 2024, bilateral trade with Vietnam grew by 28.1%, but Havana barely sold 5.6 million dollars compared to $ 193.7 million exported by Hanói. Much greater is the volume with China, which between January and July 2025 exchanged goods with Cuba worth 759 million dollars, 73.3% more than in the same period of 2024, although it is unknown which part corresponds to each country.
In 2024, bilateral trade with Vietnam grew by 28.1%, but Havana barely sold 5.6 million dollars compared to $ 193.7 million exported by Hanói
“Chinese exports to Cuba have doubled compared to the same period of the previous year,” says the Chinese ambassador to Havana Hua Xin on Wednesday, which reveals the data updated in a Interview with the official weekly Workerswith Díaz-Canel’s trip as a backdrop. The official states that his country is the third commercial partner of the island and that there is a “solid political base” to continue on that path.
“In recent years, companies from both countries have actively explored new commercial models, such as cross -border electronic commerce. This has served to connect needs and negotiate cooperation. Direct, passenger and cargo flights have been launched, between China and Cuba, which further facilitates trade,” he recalls.
Beijing, reviews, matters from the island “mainly minerals, shellfish, tobacco, pharmaceutical products and alcohol”, while Cuba buys “electrical equipment, machinery, vehicles, steel and plastics.” Hua adds that Chinese companies “actively participate in the development of energy, electricity, agriculture and telecommunications sectors” and argues that the objective is to contribute to the energy transition, food security and the improvement of the living conditions of the population.
In the absence of numbers, although it is its first destination in exports, in all 2023 Cuba sent Beijing goods worth $ 358 million According to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC), an amount that has fallen in the last two years, beginning with the impossibility of selling a sugar that the island no longer produces for itself.
However, and from Hua’s words, China has a look set further than in immediate businesses. “Cuba is the starting point of relations between China and Latin America and the Caribbean, the cradle of the Chinese-Celac forum and a bridge for relations in the area,” he says. The ambassador dedicates broad paragraphs to talk about the new threats to international security, of an interconnected world in which it is a priority to build a community from multilateralism and how Xi Jinping proposed in 2014 “the construction of the community of the Chinese-Latin America and the Caribbean shared future”. Among the milestones of that new relationship, in addition to Cuba, it places Brazil.
The ambassador also speaks of the 65 years of relationship with Cuba, “first country of the Western hemisphere in establishing diplomatic ties with the People’s Republic of China” and the “high quality links” between both nations, care of leaders such as “Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, Fidel Castro, Raúl Castro and other generations.” It also highlights that both are socialist countries, despite the abysmal differences of their economic models, with a China openly neocapitalist.
It also highlights that both are socialist countries, despite the abysmal differences of their economic models, with an openly neocapitalist China
Hua has also referred to the event that Diaz-Canel attended today, attributing to China all the merit of the defeat of the Japanese army during World War II and, while warning about what history teaches so as not to repeat errors, warns in the future. “We must not forget, in particular, that Taiwan’s return to China was also the result of the victory of World War II and became an important component of the international order that was imposed in the postwar period. Countries must respect the sovereignty and territorial integrity of others. Persecute personal interests through war and military invasion fundamentally violates the nature and demands of human civilization and is absolutely intolerable for the planet’s peoples.”
Hua, who takes the opportunity to condemn the US embargo on Cuba, is not any ambassador. Since he arrived on the island, in June 2024, he has been a regular collaborator of Granmaplatform that uses – along with X – to account for its work on the island, and publishes small “manifestos” on its activity.
The ambassador also promised that his diplomatic headquarters would be “a warm home” for Chinese citizens living on the island, an expression that contrasted with the state of the Chung Wah casino, the “main center of the Chinese community in Cuba”, whose depouperadas facilities visited Hua Xin a month after arriving in the country.
Very active on the island, Hua held meetings with the official press, senior military controls from the beginning and, of course, with the head of Energy and Mines, Vicente de la O Levy, who accompanies Díaz-Canel in his Asian tour and, to whom he promised his “firm support in the energy transition of Cuba”. The construction of solar parks with Chinese companies advances at a good pace, but has failed to reduce the blackouts.
Hua Xin, it is said, has entrusted the “socialist modernization” of Cuba, but this diplomatic enthusiastic task is resisting to date. “The opening is the distinctive symbol of China,” Hua Xin wrote in Granma Upon arrival. It was an indirect that his comrades in the Communist Party of Cuba did not understand. Or they didn’t want to understand.
