The chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Ukrainian Parliament stated that he does not understand how the European Union continues to maintain economic cooperation with Havana.
MIAMI, United States – The chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Ukrainian Parliament, Oleksandr Merezhko, called for sanctions to be imposed on the Cuban regime for sending fighters to the Russian front in the war against Ukraine. His remarks came during an extraordinary bilateral meeting between the Foreign Relations Committees of the UK and Ukrainian Parliaments held at Westminster Palace, the seat of the British Parliament.
According to a statement from the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC) sent to CubaNetMerezhko highlighted as a priority during the session “the need for sanctions against the totalitarian Cuban regime for sending fighters to support Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.” His statement was made in response to a question from a British MP about international contingents fighting on Russia’s side.
In addressing the question, Merezhko specifically mentioned North Korea and Cuba, and said he could not understand how the European Union continues to maintain economic cooperation with Havana. He noted that one way for democracies to show solidarity would be to sanction regimes that support Russian aggression. “An expression of solidarity among democratic nations would be to apply sanctions to totalitarian regimes that cooperate with Russian aggression,” he stated, according to the ARC.
The Ukrainian lawmaker also called for a change in the European Union’s policy toward the Cuban government within the framework of the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement (PDCA). I have recalled that under this agreement, the EU maintains “80 development projects in Cuba (…) worth around 155 million euros,” despite the fact that the regime has violated the human rights commitments outlined in Article 1 of the PDCA and, at the same time, “threatens the integrity of Europe through its alliance with Russia,” according to the ARC statement.
The declaration emphasizes that, as part of the Paris Club, the United Kingdom has taken part in negotiations to forgive $8.5 billion of the $11.1 billion debt that the Cuban government has accumulated with Europe since 1986. Furthermore, since 2019, the Paris Club has granted moratoriums and adjustments to the payment schedule due to the regime’s inability to meet its financial obligations.
connected via videoconference from Kyiv, Merezhko denounced the high number of Cubans who, according to Ukrainian authorities, are fighting in Russian ranks. “About 20,000 Cubans. Can you imagine that? We’ve been raising this issue. Officially, Cuba says it has nothing to do with this, but we understand that Cuba is a totalitarian state, and they couldn’t come to fight without the — perhaps tacit — permission of the Cuban authorities,” he said. “That’s another big problem: totalitarian regimes show solidarity with each other, so we, too, should have solidarity among democratic countries.”
Merezhko’s remarks come after Ukraine announced the closure of its embassy in Havana this past October and voted against lifting the US embargo on the Cuban regime at the United Nations. As the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance (ARC) recalled, Kyiv justified these decisions by citing “Havana’s unwillingness to halt the mass deployment of its citizens in the Russian war against Ukraine,” which, in the view of Ukrainian authorities, “constitutes an act of complicity in the aggression and must be condemned in the strongest possible terms.” “This gesture is not sudden. It has serious reasons. Let us remember that the Cuban president wished Putin ‘success’ in his war of aggression against Ukraine. We heard it clearly,” said Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha at the time, according to the statement.
Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion, the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance has denounced, in international forums and parliaments, the deployment of Cuban mercenaries by the Havana regime to join the Russian army, the document states. The ARC says it has sent delegations to Kyiv to meet with Cuban fighters captured by Ukrainian forces and has repeatedly called for an end to European financial aid and concessions to the Cuban government.
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