What Is Driving Cuba’s Economic Crisis?
https://belly-of-the-beast.kit.com/posts/what-is-driving-cuba-s-economic-crisis

April 24, 2026
[weekly newsletter about #Cuba from the #BellyOfTheBeast #news collective. Their videos can be found at: https://peertube.world/c/cuba_botb_videos/videos]

What happens when a small country is cut off from global finance, trade networks and investment flows in an increasingly interconnected world?

This week development economist Emily Morris breaks down the massive impact of the US #EconomicWar on Cuba in an interview with Belly of the Beast.

“If the U.S. were to lift sanctions, the Cuban economy, within five years, would be prosperous,” Morris says.

Also:

• Lawmakers Denied Meeting with Top US Diplomat
• Cuba Confirms Havana Talks with #Trump Administration
• “Vida”: A Community Project Helping Kids in Cuba’s Crisis
• Amid Shortages, Cuba Marks 65 Years of #Socialism
• #US #Military Drone Flies Along Cuban Coast
• #Spain, #Mexico and #Brazil Commit to Help Cuba
• Grenada Stands by Cuban #Doctors

#politics

Prime Minister Mark Carney said Canada's ties to the U.S. have become 'weaknesses' that must be corrected.
#PrimeMinisterMarkCarney #Canada #PrimeMinisterCarney #EconomicWar #CommerceSecretaryHowardLutnick #America #CUSMA #SirIsaacBrock #Warof1812 #ElbowsUp #CanadianTradePolicy

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/carney-trump-trade-u-s-negotiations-weaknesses-9.7169671

Video - From Miami to Havana: Why This Cuban American Is Speaking Out
https://peertube.world/w/j3V8K63g6adySjvVGwLEmu

[a #video about #Cuba from the #news collective #BellyOfTheBeast]

Cuban-American politicians have long been a driving force behind the US government’s #EconomicWar on the island. But many people of Cuban origin living in the US reject the hard-line policies that have ravaged the island’s economy and caused widespread scarcities and hardship.

Danny Valdes, a Cuban American born in #Miami, recently visited Cuba with the #NuestraAméricaConvoy to help bring #HumanitarianAid to the island.

“There is a very well organized and powerful right wing Cuban lobby, that even is in the halls of the Congress that gets to determine what #US policy is toward Cuba,” said Valdés. “But we feel like it's a very important time now to say, not in our name.”

#OilForCuba!
#EndTheBlockadeEmbargo
#CubaSolidarity
#LetCubaLive
#SolidaridadConCuba
#PetróleoParaCuba
#LatinAmerica #Caribbean
#politics #USpol

Opinion | 'Economic Statecraft' Exposed: A Key Pillar of US Hybrid Warfare for All to See | Common Dreams
https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/economic-statecraft

"In an interview at Davos, Secretary Bessent explained in detail how US Treasury sanctions were deliberately designed to drive Iran’s currency to collapse, cripple its banking system, and drive Iran’s population into the streets."

#Iran #Venezuela #USA #EconomicWar

"As demonstrators flood Iranian streets in ongoing protests which started late last month, United States President Donald Trump has threatened military intervention, arguing that he wants to “help” protesters.

He wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform on Saturday: “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!!” He has since echoed those sentiments in other public statements.

But ignored in his claims of wanting to help Iranians is a fact: decades of US-led sanctions against Iran, including ones that were toughened under Trump, have played a central role in the country’s economic crises that were the primary trigger for the current spate of protests.

We unpack the impact of US sanctions on Iran and whether its track record in the country has been one of helping people."

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/1/13/how-us-sanctions-crippled-lives-of-iranians-trump-says-he-wants-to-help

#USA #Iran #Sanctions #EconomicWar #Trump

"China’s leaders have spent years preparing for Trump’s return and view the trade war as part of a much larger contest that is likely to last for decades. In the short term, Beijing’s priority is securing the concessions on advanced technology needed to accelerate semiconductor development in China and reduce reliance on imports. In the medium term, it aims to deepen technological capacity, diversify export markets, and capture a larger share of value-added exports in global supply chains to reduce U.S. leverage. In the long run, it intends to build an alternative global trading and financial architecture strong enough to strip the United States of its unilateral sanctioning power. Above all, China wants recognition that its core interests lie beyond even the threat of Western interference—that it has full freedom of action within its sphere of influence, including Taiwan and its regional periphery, and that it can engage economically with the world on terms no less favorable than those accorded to the United States or other great powers.

In essence, China is attempting a geopolitical feat without precedent. It seeks to obtain an equal place alongside the United States without triggering “the Thucydides trap’’—the tendency for rising and established hegemons to come to blows. Unlike earlier revisionist powers, China intends to complete its ascent through the steady accumulation of economic power and influence rather than through military conquest. To succeed, it must not merely draw even with the United States but surpass it in some areas, to the point that any U.S. refusal to acknowledge its superpower status appears absurd to the rest of the world.

As this protracted struggle unfolds, conventional side-by-side comparisons of economic data or military capability are unlikely to provide a clear indication of which side is ahead, which is slipping behind, and why."
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/china/chinas-long-economic-war-zongyuan-zoe-liu#
#China #EconomicWar #USA #Empires #Imperialism #Superpowers #PoliticalEconomy

"Trump has a standard ploy. He said, well, of course we can roll back the tariffs that would threaten to destabilize your economy; but we want a “giveback”. This is a simple protection racket, is what we call it in the United States.

Trump has said, well, if you follow certain US policies, and if you will agree to transplant your industry to the United States and help us industrialize, take your automobile plants, your industrial manufacturing, your key industries.

…

Yes, Volkswagen, just like Hyundai in Korea, and Nissan [in Japan], all these countries; your companies can continue to make profits, but you’ll make them by offshoring your production from your home country to the United States.

And so he has extracted promises for them to shift to the United States, and promises to roll back tariffs in exchange for their support of US policies.

…

Both Trump and Secretary of State Rubio said, this is not serving us anymore; we can't compete in a fair market. We're not going to be fair, because we don't have to be, because other countries have become so dependent on the American market, that we can punch them in the face, and destabilize their economies, if we want.

They really don't have a choice but to surrender. That was what America believed.

…

And these deals actually serve as an object lesson for saying, well, you have the new international order that is being defined by the SCO and the BRICS meetings — and the alternative, just look at what the United States has done to Europe, Japan, and Korea, that is the alternative."

https://www.geopoliticaleconomy.report/p/trump-economic-war-us-allies-michael-hudson

#USA #Trump #Tariffs #BRICS #EconomicWar #TradeWar #Geopolitics #PoliticalEconomy

The West risks losing $285 billion in investments if Russia retaliates against asset seizures. 💰 #Russia #West #AssetSeizure #EconomicWar #Ukraine

https://kokcha.news/8607/?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=jetpack_social

https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/live/2025/04/08/en-direct-droits-de-douane-la-maison-blanche-confirme-que-les-taxes-contre-la-chine-vont-grimper-a-104-mercredi_6592284_3234.html

#fucktrump #economicwar #EuropeanPowersUnited #economicdisaster #handsoff