MIAMI — Forty people attended a June 18, 2026, speak out here opposing U.S. war threats against Cuba. The Miami Coalition to End the U.S. Blockade of Cuba and the campus Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) sponsored the meeting. The event took place on the main campus of Florida International University (FIU).
Harlem, New York— Organized by the new Blacks4Cuba coalition and led by the December 12th Movement, 100 people, overwhelmingly Black, took to the streets on June 20, 2026, demanding “No War On Cuba!” This was just one of what was projected to be an ongoing campaign of organizing and activity in the Black community focused on solidarity with Cuba.
Cuban President Explains Critical Need for Economic Reforms: On June 17, 2026, the Central Committee of Cuba’s Communist Party approved a series of economic reforms to be considered by the National Assembly of People’s Power.The reforms come as Washington’s decades-long economic war on Cuba has devastated the island’s economy, threatening the social gains of the Cuban Revolution. In the speech published here, Cuba’s president Miguel Díaz-Canel stated, “When life for the people becomes so difficult, the primary duty of the Communist Party and the revolutionary government is not to explain the crisis better, but to change whatever needs to be changed to overcome it. The transformations we are proposing are intended to advance the defense of socialism.”
On June 18, 2026, Cuba’s National Assembly of People’s Power — the country’s highest legislative body — adopted an extensive series of economic reforms after extensive debate. The Central Committee of Cuba’s Communist Party had approved the same measures a day earlier. The Cuban government made these decisions as the Cuban people face a dire humanitarian crisis caused largely by Washington’s relentless economic war for nearly seven decades, exacerbated this year by a blockade of oil imports into the island and new draconian U.S. sanctions. The reforms seem to signal an organized retreat with substantial openings to the capitalist market. They are “conceived as a sovereign exercise to preserve the conquests of the Revolution without renouncing socialism,” said Cuba’s prime minister Manuel Marrero Cruz.
On June 8, 2026, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk issued a declaration condemning Washington’s unrelenting economic war against Cuba, escalated this year with an oil blockade. He called for the immediate lifting of all U.S. sanctions, which are creating dire consequences for the Cuban people. “Such severe sanctions packages that target entire sectors of an economy and produce broad, indiscriminate, and harsh effects on populations are incompatible with basic principles of international human rights law,” Türk said. The declaration published below accurately presents the devastating effects of the blockade of fuel, Trump’s May 1 executive order, and all the other U.S. sanctions designed to suffocate the Cuban economy.
CHICAGO – An audience of over 100 workers, union activists, and organizers from more than a dozen unions attended a reception here for representatives of the Cuban Embassy in Washington. The event – sponsored by Building Relations with Cuban Labor (BRWCL) with the support of the Chicago Cuba Coalition – was part of the annual Labor Notes conference from June 12-14, 2026, that brought together 4,700 union activists and organizers from across the country, and several delegations from other nations. Tanieris Diéguez, deputy head of the Cuban mission to the United Nations, spoke of the impact of the U.S. blockade on the lives of the Cuban people. She emphasized that Cuba is a “country of peace” and is open to talk about cooperation with the United States, but only on the basis of respect for Cuba’s national sovereignty. However, she added, we will “fight to defend our honor” against all acts of U.S. aggression.
Nothing illustrates the criminality, hypocrisy, and brutality of Washington’s economic war against Cuba better than its impact on the island’s universal healthcare system and highly advanced biotech sector. And the consequences can be felt far beyond Cuba’s shores in countries around the globe. When the Cuban Revolution overthrew the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1959 and broke the grip of the capitalist class on the island, one of the first priorities was to take some of the country’s wealth that previously went into the purses of the dictator and his cronies and turn it toward extending healthcare to the masses of people. That progress is now threatened, along with the lives of the Cuban people and of others internationally who rely on life-altering treatments and medicines from the island, as the article that follows details.
This is the second of two parts with excerpts from the transcript of a press conference Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez gave on March 13, 2026, as the Cuban people continued to resist Washington’s siege on their country. With characteristic frankness and transparency, Díaz-Canel responded to Trump’s threats and to journalists’ questions about the everyday challenges the Cuban people are diligently working to overcome. Challenges resulting from Washington’s relentless economic war, escalated recently with the U.S. blockade preventing any petroleum from reaching the country.
On March 13, 2026, as the Cuban people continued to resist Washington’s siege on their country, Cuba’s president Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez met with reporters in Havana. With characteristic frankness and transparency, Díaz-Canel responded to Trump’s threats and to journalists’ questions about the everyday challenges the Cuban people are diligently working to overcome, resulting from Washington’s economic war, intensified recently with the U.S. blockade preventing any oil from reaching the country. This is the first of two parts.
NEW YORK CITY — About 225 delegates representing organizations across the United States and Canada attended the conference “Cuba Under Siege: Strategies for Resistance and a United Response.” In welcoming delegates to the meeting, Ike Nahem of the New York-New Jersey Cuba Sí Coalition, said: “The conference is taking place at an ominous time. A time of imperialist war in the Mideast and intervention in our hemisphere, marked by the January 3 U.S. attack on Venezuela and the kidnapping of the country’s president Nicolás Maduro and his wife Celia Flores, and the siege of Cuba under the U.S. blockade of petroleum to the country.” Nahem called on delegates to focus on actions that represent a united response to this qualitative turn of events in the world situation.
This is a speech Osmayda Hernández Beleño, director of international relations of the Federation of Cuban Women, gave on March 14, 2026. That day, the FMC leader addressed the opening of a conference at the City University of New York Graduate Center in Manhattan, New York, on normalizing relations between the United States and Cuba.
On February 27, National Nurses United issued a press release calling for an end to the U.S. blockade of Cuba. NNU president Mary Turner called Washington’s efforts to asphyxiate the Cuban population by cutting off the nation’s supply of fuel “an unconscionable violation of human rights and international law.” She noted that the healthcare crisis created by lack of fuel, and electricity from oil-fired generation, particularly impacts pregnant women and children. “As nurses,” she said, “we will not be silent when our nation’s policies cause immense suffering for any people, whether at home or abroad.”