Madrid, Spain — The streets of Cuba are filled with soldiers amid fears of an uprising, a journalist in the Caribbean island said as the United States threatened to take over the Communist state.
Cuba’s leader on Tuesday said the U.S. would face “unbreakable resistance” if it tries to take over the impoverished island nation, as communist authorities scrambled to fix a nationwide electricity blackout.
The Cuban government is under increasing pressure, with Washington enforcing an oil blockade and openly stating it wants to end the nearly seven-decade-old US standoff with the one-party communist state.
U.S. President Donald Trump, who has heaped pressure on Cuba’s government, said on Monday he would “take” Cuba, adding: “We’ll be doing something with Cuba very soon.”
Cuban president Miguel Diaz-Canel was defiant in the face of Washington’s threats.
“Faced with the worst-case scenario, Cuba has one guarantee: any external aggressor will encounter an unbreakable resistance,” he wrote in a statement on X.
On the streets of Cuba, troops have been deployed in most cities, said Carlos Michael Morales Rodriguez, 48, an independent journalist.
“For eleven days running, there have been protests on the streets, principally in Havana. In the wake of a major protest in Morón, the regime has decided to militarize the principal cities of the island,” he told Latin America Reports from his home in Cuba where he is under house arrest.
Rodriguez, who works for Martinoticias, CiberCuba and CubaNet Noticias, was convicted in 2021 of counter revolutionary acts for posting on Facebook “posts which criticized the leaders of our country”.
He served two years and ten months but when he was released in 2024, he was placed under house arrest.
Rodriguez said: “The communist party offices are guarded by members of the party and by the political police. They also guard parks and squares.
“Where I live they ask the identification of any young people. Anyone who does not have ID must leave public areas.”
He added that there was a curfew in private bars and restaurants which must close at 12:00 am.
“The power cuts in the city where I live, Villa Clara, means that mobile phones have almost no coverage to the internet. So it is hard for me to write to you just now,” he said.
Cuba is open to broad talks with Washington and allowing more investment, but it will not discuss changing its political system, an envoy told AFP news agency on Tuesday.
Power was restored to two-thirds of the country early Tuesday, including to 45 percent of the capital Havana, home to 1.7 million people.
Cuba’s ageing electricity generation system is in shambles, with daily power outages of up to 20 hours the norm in parts of the island, which lacks the fuel needed to generate power.
No oil has been imported to Cuba since January 9, hitting the power sector while also forcing airlines to curtail flights to the island, a blow to its all-important tourism sector.
Featured image: Protests March 14 in Cuba.
Image credit: Observatorio Cubano de Derechos Humanos
