[News] Cuban president slams US for “genocidal act” of depriving Cubans of oxygen during the pandemic

[Anti-Imperialist News]

 Cuban president slams US for “genocidal act” of depriving Cubans of oxygen
during the pandemic

Cuba was prohibited from accessing spare parts for their only oxygen plant
as well as importing medical oxygen due to the blockade, as COVID-19 ran
rampant
July 11, 2023
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/07/11/cuban-president-slams-us-for-genocidal-act-of-depriving-cubans-of-oxygen-during-the-pandemic/>
by
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/07/11/cuban-president-slams-us-for-genocidal-act-of-depriving-cubans-of-oxygen-during-the-pandemic/>Peoples
Dispatch
https://peoplesdispatch.org/2023/07/11/cuban-president-slams-us-for-genocidal-act-of-depriving-cubans-of-oxygen-during-the-pandemic/
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/author/pd/>

Cuban President Miguel Díaz Canel on the streets in July 2021.

On July 10, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel condemned the US for denying
the Cuban people oxygen as the Delta variant of COVID-19 ran rampant across
the country in 2021. Cuba’s only oxygen plant had to cease production
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2022/11/03/the-world-condemns-the-us-blockade-against-cuba/>
because it could not acquire spare parts due to the US blockade against
Cuba.

“We will never forget the genocidal act of the US Government when, with its
blockade policy, it denied and hindered the acquisition of oxygen for the
people of Cuba <https://twitter.com/hashtag/Cuba?src=hashtag_click>, in the
midst of the worst moment of the pandemic, when our only plant broke down,”
wrote <https://twitter.com/DiazCanelB/status/1678494117427290113?s=20>
Díaz-Canel on Twitter on Monday. “That’s how real and criminal the
[blockade] is.”

The blockade also made it impossible for Cuba to import medical oxygen.
“Anyone having any doubts about our assertion that the blockade, as
established by Article II (b) and (c) of the Convention on the Crime of
Genocide, qualifies as an act of genocide, because it intended to cause
deliberate mental and physical damage to a community and jeopardize its
living conditions, should have dispelled all of them during the COVID-19
pandemic,” said
<https://twitter.com/BrunoRguezP/status/1678740197482151938?s=20> Cuban
foreign minister Bruno Rodríguez in an intervention in Cuba’s National
Assembly <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPJ4khEJ8LY> on May 25, 2023.
“The initial measure was to ban imports of any sort by Cuba, particularly
to prevent the import of mechanical ventilators. There were measures
against the scaling-up of Cuban vaccine production, because for that we
required equipment, spare parts, supplies, and products. There were
measures to prevent importation of oxygen from third countries.”

“It became clear that it was not possible to import medicines from the
United States; that it was not possible to import oxygen during the
pandemic from the United States without a specific license from the US
government,” he said. “There can be no doubt about the deliberately cruel
and genocidal character of the blockade.”

According <https://twitter.com/BrunoRguezP/status/1676216812139163650?s=20>
to Rodríguez, “Attempts to import [medical oxygen] from the US were
unsuccessful, as a specific license was needed, which requires the approval
of at least 5 US federal agencies.”

Despite the blockade, Cuba was able to develop five of its own COVID-19
vaccines
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2022/08/19/cuban-vaccine-to-be-produced-in-italy-in-attempt-to-solve-who-prequalification-hurdle/>,
and only suffered 8,530 deaths <https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/region/cuba>
due to the virus versus the US, which suffered over one million deaths. In
other words, in Cuba, approximately eight people per 10,000 living on the
island died from COVID-19, whereas in the US, approximately 34 per 10,000
died from the disease.
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