ANALYSIS

Cuba in the dark: the embargo, the oil cut-off and the vote the UN has repeated for thirty years

20 October 2026 — Havana / New York

The background

Why there is an embargo. The reasons have changed three times.

The first is the revolution. Fidel Castro took power in 1959. In the summer of 1960 Cuba seized the American refineries, which had refused to process Soviet oil; Washington cut its purchases of Cuban sugar, and Havana responded by nationalising all American property on the island, without compensation. In October 1960 the United States banned exports to Cuba, except food and medicine. In January 1961 it broke off diplomatic relations, in April it backed the failed landing of exiles at the Bay of Pigs, and on 7 February 1962 Kennedy imposed a near-total embargo. In October, with Soviet missiles on the island, Cuba became the most dangerous front of the Cold War. There were two reasons: the confiscated property, for which the US government has certified more than 5,900 compensation claims, and the alliance with Moscow (Congressional Research Service).

The second is democracy. With the Soviet Union gone, the military threat disappeared, but the embargo was not lifted: it became law and grew harsher. A 1992 law extended it to the foreign subsidiaries of American companies. In February 1996 Cuban fighter jets shot down two small planes belonging to an exile group, killing four people; less than three weeks later Clinton signed the Helms-Burton Act. The law states that the embargo can end only when Cuba has a democratically elected government, and since then no president can lift it alone: Congress is needed. A 2000 law allows food and medicine to be sold to Cuba, but only for cash in advance and without credit (Congressional Research Service). In 2014-2016 Obama reopened the embassies, but the embargo stayed.

The third is changing the government. Today Washington speaks of repression, of political prisoners, of Havana's ties with Russia, China and Iran, and keeps it on the list of state sponsors of terrorism. But in 2026 President Trump said openly that the goal is to bring down the government.

The UN vote. Every year since 1992 the General Assembly has voted on a resolution calling for an end to the embargo. Its resolutions are not binding. In 2025 only the United States, Israel, Argentina, Paraguay, Hungary, North Macedonia and Ukraine voted against (PassBlue).

The facts

From trade to oil. On 3 January 2026 the United States attacked Venezuela and captured President Nicolás Maduro (we wrote about it here). Venezuelan oil supplies to Cuba stopped, and Mexico suspended its own: together they covered about three quarters of the island's oil imports (House of Commons Library). On 29 January an executive order by Trump declared a national emergency over Cuba and provided for tariffs on countries selling it oil. On 20 February the Supreme Court ruled that the law used does not allow the president to impose tariffs, but the emergency remains in force and supplies have not resumed. According to legal scholars Michael Schmitt and Rob McLaughlin, Washington has seized tankers under its sanctions on Venezuela and Iran, and US patrols and drones watch the routes to the island (Just Security). Since January a single tanker, a Russian one, has reached Cuba. On 7 October US authorities seized 90 shipments of biodiesel bound for Cuban private businesses (Al Jazeera).

Trump's words. On 5 March Trump said a change of government in Cuba is "just a question of time" (Al Jazeera). On 27 March, speaking about military successes in Venezuela and Iran, he added: "And Cuba is next, by the way. But pretend I didn't say that" (Malay Mail). Secretary of State Marco Rubio explained that the campaign is "engineered to make the government feel like there are no escape valves" (CBS News).

What is happening on the island. The power grid, old and dependent on oil, is close to collapse: in most of the country, Havana included, electricity comes on for a few hours a day. At a children's hospital, doctors say they can no longer obtain life-saving drugs (CBS News). In May the UN humanitarian office and the World Health Organization counted more than 100,000 patients waiting for a postponed operation, including 11,000 children (House of Commons Library). Meanwhile the sanctions have widened: in July to energy companies, in August to mining and construction companies (Al Jazeera), in October to a state bank accused of ties to Iran (CBS News).

Washington's version. US ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz denies that the crisis is caused by the embargo or by an oil blockade, and blames it on the failure of the communist economy and on corruption. In June he announced 100 million dollars in aid to be distributed through the Catholic Church, and pointed out that fuel supplies to private businesses are allowed (House of Commons Library). The United States is also one of the island's food suppliers: in 2025 it sold Cuba nearly half a billion dollars of farm products, mostly chicken (US Department of Agriculture). According to Cuba's energy minister, however, private fuel covers less than 3% of the country's needs (Al Jazeera).

Havana's responsibilities. According to the NGO Prisoners Defenders, in April there were 1,260 political prisoners in Cuba, including some minors arrested after the protests over the blackouts. That same month the government pardoned 2,010 inmates, but according to the NGO none of them was a political prisoner (RTP). Between 2021 and 2025, before the oil blockade, the island's food production had more than halved. In June parliament approved reforms opening the door to private banks and to businesses with more than a hundred employees, with no timetable for applying them. According to Human Rights Watch, the government uses the embargo as a pretext for repression (House of Commons Library).

At the UN. On 6 August a group of independent UN experts called on the United States to revoke its measures, describing them as contrary to international law: "Food must never be used as an instrument of political pressure" (DevelopmentAid). In July, during a special debate in the General Assembly, the European Union acknowledged the embargo's humanitarian impact but said that the plight of Cubans is not due to the embargo alone, and criticised Havana's positions on the war in Ukraine (UN). On 19 October, ahead of the vote, Waltz organised a meeting with Cuban dissidents at UN headquarters and asked diplomats to vote against the resolution; the Cuban ambassador accused him of lying (PassBlue).

Legal commentary

Refusing to trade is not unlawful. International law does not oblige one state to trade with another: an embargo, in itself, is a political choice. But the three reasons used to justify it today need to be tested one by one.

Human rights. Sanctioning those who violate human rights is permitted: freezing the assets of those responsible or banning them from travel is a widespread and accepted practice. The problem arises when a whole population is hit to punish its government. The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights wrote as much in 1997: those who impose sanctions must take account of their effect on the population. A state may respond to a wrongful act with countermeasures, but these may not affect fundamental human rights. Michael Schmitt, professor emeritus at the US Naval War College, and Rob McLaughlin, who teaches at Australia's military academy after twenty years in the navy, note that the US measures respond to no wrongful act committed by Cuba against the United States, and that the collapse of the power grid and of medical care falls squarely within that limit (Just Security). The exemption for food and medicine is not enough when there is no fuel for ambulances and no power for operating theatres.

Alliances. Choosing one's allies is one of the decisions international law leaves to each state. The International Court of Justice said so in its 1986 Nicaragua judgment, against the United States itself: a state may not use coercion on matters that another state is entitled to decide freely, such as its political system and its foreign policy. A foreign military base near one's borders can be a legitimate security concern. But it is a reason to negotiate, not to coerce.

Changing the government. This is the clearest reason, and the one the law most clearly forbids. The Helms-Burton Act ties the end of the embargo to a change of government, and Trump has said openly that this is the goal. For Schmitt and McLaughlin, cutting off a country's oil to force it to change its government violates the prohibition on intervening in another state's internal affairs. They also conclude that Trump's threats ("Cuba is next") may violate the prohibition on the threat of force in the UN Charter (art. 2, para. 4). For now, however, it is not a naval blockade in the legal sense, because there is no war between the two countries.

Rules imposed on others. Part of the embargo hits third countries: the foreign subsidiaries of American companies, those who use confiscated property, and now those who sell oil to Cuba. The European Union considers these rules contrary to international law and since 1996 has had a regulation forbidding European companies to comply with them (Regulation (EC) No 2271/96).

The missing judge. Even when a rule is broken, no court can enforce it against Washington. In 1985, while it was losing the Nicaragua case itself, the Reagan administration withdrew its acceptance of the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (Christian Science Monitor). General Assembly resolutions are not binding, and in the Security Council the United States has a veto. That is why the vote has been repeated, unchanged, for thirty years without changing anything.

Symmetry test

• Washington has not achieved the embargo's stated goal in 64 years. In 2026 it chose measures that hit the whole population, and its leaders say openly that the aim is to bring down the government.
• Havana represses dissent and holds more than a thousand political prisoners, and its economy was already in deep crisis before the oil blockade. Blaming everything on the embargo is an excuse, as Human Rights Watch and the European Union note.
• Bases near borders. If a Russian or Chinese military presence 150 kilometres from Florida is a legitimate concern for Washington, so is the presence of NATO troops in the Baltic states, along the Russian border, for Moscow. There is only one yardstick: Cuba has the right to choose its allies just as Estonia, Poland or Finland chose NATO, and in neither case does a neighbour's fear justify coercion or war. Understanding Moscow's reasons, as we wrote in our seven proposals for Europe, does not mean putting the aggressor against Ukraine and its victim on the same level.
• The 1962 precedent. The missile crisis did not end with a harsher embargo, but with a trade: the Soviet missiles left Cuba, the United States pledged not to invade the island and secretly withdrew its own missiles from Turkey (National Security Archive). Two powers acknowledged the same fear in each other.
• Europe votes against the embargo and forbids its companies to comply with it. Yet it applies sanctions of its own, against Russia, and since 2023 has also targeted companies from third countries, Chinese, Emirati and Uzbek, accused of helping Moscow get around them (Euronews). The stated difference is the purpose: stopping a war of aggression, not changing a government. But those who challenge American extraterritoriality must accept that the same yardstick applies to them.
• Russia and Venezuela supported Cuba when it suited them. Today Venezuela no longer sends oil, and a single tanker has arrived from Russia.

Our assessment

This section expresses the site's position. It is separate from the facts set out above.

Taken one by one, the reasons for the embargo contradict each other. Cubans' human rights are defended by hitting all Cubans. Havana is punished for its alliances, which the law leaves to its free choice. And the last reason, the one stated openly, bringing down the government, is the most clearly prohibited.

But a distinction must be made. A country has the right not to trade with a government it dislikes, and the trade embargo, however useless after 64 years, is a political choice. It does not have the right to leave a whole population in the dark to force it to change its government. That is the line the United States crossed in 2026. It is not only Cuba and the UN who say so: so do two legal scholars who teach law to the American and Australian military. When the Secretary of State explains that the aim is to leave no "escape valves", the target is no longer a government, but those who live under it.

This does not absolve Havana. The Cuban government jails those who protest over the power cuts, has wrecked the economy partly on its own and uses the embargo to avoid answering for anything. But a government's faults do not transfer the punishment to those who suffer under it. It is the same rule we ask for in sanctions against Russia: hit those who decide, not the hospitals.

In 1962 Washington and Moscow, on the brink of nuclear war, managed to acknowledge the same fears in each other and make a trade. Sixty years later, with an island without electricity, it seems harder. On 27 and 28 October the General Assembly will vote again, and the resolution will in all likelihood pass by a large majority. Nothing will change, as every year. What would matter more than the vote is for European governments, which have voted against the embargo for thirty years, to apply their own law, and for fuel to reach Cuban hospitals.

What to watch

• The General Assembly vote on 27 and 28 October, and how many countries change position.
• New sanctions or seizures of cargo bound for Cuba.
• The implementation of the economic reforms approved in June.
• Political prisoners and arrests after the protests over the blackouts.

Sources: Congressional Research Service · Congressional Research Service · PassBlue · House of Commons Library · Just Security · Al Jazeera · Al Jazeera · Malay Mail · CBS News · Al Jazeera · US Department of Agriculture · RTP · DevelopmentAid · UN · Regulation (EC) No 2271/96 · Christian Science Monitor · National Security Archive · Euronews

Related pieces: For the Non-Recognition of the Conduct of the United States of America · Interests first, order second. And no nuclear power is pushing back

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