...
By Brendan Cole
Senior Reporter
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
Russian fuel shipments are heading to Cuba, according to maritime tracking data, in a development that could test President Donald Trump’s effort to choke off the island’s energy supplies.
A U.S.-sanctioned Russian tanker, Anatoly Kolodkin, is carrying crude to Cuba, while a second vessel is believed to be transporting Russian diesel or gasoil.
The Anatoly Kolodkin, owned by the Russian state company Sovcomflot, loaded 730,000 barrels of Urals crude in the Russian port of Primorsk on March 8 and could arrive in Cuba as early as March 23, according to analytics firm Kpler.
Read More on News
The vessel is sanctioned by the U.S. and the EU as part of measures aimed at punishing Moscow for its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The second tanker, the Hong Kong-flagged Sea Horse, is reported to be carrying approximately 200,000 barrels of Russian diesel fuel which could arrive in Cuba by the weekend, according to maritime tracking data.
...
The U.S. capture of Venezuela's former leader Nicolás Maduro deprived Cuba of an ally whose oil had provided a lifeline to the island. Havana faced even more pressure after Mexico also cut off supplies, bringing the country to the verge of economic collapse.
However, the approach of the Russian vessels could test how far the Trump administration is willing to go to stop fresh fuel shipments from reaching Cuba.
Trump has suggested that the U.S. could take over Cuba, telling reporters at the White House on Monday: "I could do anything I want with it... They’re a very weakened nation right now."
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said this week that Moscow was committed to helping authorities in Havana and was "ready to provide all possible assistance." The countries were involved in "working levels" of contact during the energy crisis, he added.
Trump’s rhetoric prompted Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel to say that any U.S. aggression would be met with "impregnable resistance."
In his first response to Trump's rhetoric about the island, the Cuban leader said in an X post on Tuesday: "The U.S. publicly threatens Cuba almost daily with the forceful overthrow of its constitutional order."
Cuba's foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez, also condemned the U.S. in an X post on Wednesday which accused Washington of trying to destroy the country's constitutional order.
"The collective punishment applied to us, Cubans, will not dent the full exercise of our sovereignty or our creativity," said Rodriguez. "Every aggression of the empire will clash against the irreducible will of the Cuban people."
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines