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Cuba Vows Defiance After Trump's US-Flag Map Sparks Fury
(MENAFN) Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel declared Tuesday that his country "will never again" fall under the control of any "empire," firing back at US President Donald Trump after he circulated a map showing several nations, including Cuba, cloaked in the colors of the American flag.
Writing on X, Diaz-Canel did not name Trump or his post directly, but the message was unmistakable: "Cuba knows well the meaning of having been a colony and neocolony of two empires."
He went further, invoking the island's history of struggle: "The blood that has been shed for our independence, sovereignty and self-determination will not have been in vain, and we will defend them to the last consequences."
The controversy began Monday when Trump shared the map on his Truth Social platform. The graphic depicted Mexico, Canada, Cuba, Greenland, Iceland, and portions of the Caribbean and Central America overlaid with the red, white and blue of the US flag.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez seized on the image with biting sarcasm, warning that Washington risked confusing its own citizens about basic geography. "Soon they will not know in which gulf, lake, building, country, continent or planet they are," he posted online, predicting Americans would end up "geographically disoriented."
Tensions Reach a Boiling Point
The exchange lands amid the most severe strain in US-Cuba relations in decades. Since early 2026, the Trump administration has escalated what it calls a "maximum pressure" campaign against Havana — a strategy that has included an oil blockade and, since May, secondary sanctions that have scared off foreign firms from doing business on the island. The specter of US military action has also loomed over the Cuban government throughout the standoff.
The financial toll, according to Rodriguez, has been staggering. He said Monday that the decades-old US embargo drained $8.08 billion from Cuba's economy between March 2025 and February 2026 — a 12-month record, up 7% from the prior year. He branded the sanctions regime a "cruel collective punishment" inflicted on ordinary Cubans.
A Nation Under Economic Strain
The diplomatic clash unfolds against a backdrop of deepening economic crisis, worsened by chronic energy shortages. Cuba's economy shrank 15% from 2020 to 2025, and independent economists now forecast a further contraction of as much as 10.3% this year.
Writing on X, Diaz-Canel did not name Trump or his post directly, but the message was unmistakable: "Cuba knows well the meaning of having been a colony and neocolony of two empires."
He went further, invoking the island's history of struggle: "The blood that has been shed for our independence, sovereignty and self-determination will not have been in vain, and we will defend them to the last consequences."
The controversy began Monday when Trump shared the map on his Truth Social platform. The graphic depicted Mexico, Canada, Cuba, Greenland, Iceland, and portions of the Caribbean and Central America overlaid with the red, white and blue of the US flag.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez seized on the image with biting sarcasm, warning that Washington risked confusing its own citizens about basic geography. "Soon they will not know in which gulf, lake, building, country, continent or planet they are," he posted online, predicting Americans would end up "geographically disoriented."
Tensions Reach a Boiling Point
The exchange lands amid the most severe strain in US-Cuba relations in decades. Since early 2026, the Trump administration has escalated what it calls a "maximum pressure" campaign against Havana — a strategy that has included an oil blockade and, since May, secondary sanctions that have scared off foreign firms from doing business on the island. The specter of US military action has also loomed over the Cuban government throughout the standoff.
The financial toll, according to Rodriguez, has been staggering. He said Monday that the decades-old US embargo drained $8.08 billion from Cuba's economy between March 2025 and February 2026 — a 12-month record, up 7% from the prior year. He branded the sanctions regime a "cruel collective punishment" inflicted on ordinary Cubans.
A Nation Under Economic Strain
The diplomatic clash unfolds against a backdrop of deepening economic crisis, worsened by chronic energy shortages. Cuba's economy shrank 15% from 2020 to 2025, and independent economists now forecast a further contraction of as much as 10.3% this year.
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