US Returns Focus to Cuba

Latin America Correspondent Jon Bonfiglio speaks to Rosie Wright for Times Radio.

Transcript

Rosie Wright 0:00

The relationship between the US and Cuba has been long fraught and complex. Here's the latest chapter. The Trump administration has placed an oil blockade on the island nation. That's led to blackouts, fuel shortages, and now protests. The head of the CIA has made a visit. But it seems the US won't budge unless Cuba does what it's told. Let's speak to the Latin America correspondent Jon Bonfiglio. Jon, good morning.

Jon Bonfiglio 0:24

Hi, Rosie.

Rosie Wright 0:25

So can you explain the current situation in Cuba right now? What's motivated the US administration to take this action?

Jon Bonfiglio 0:33

So specifically now, I think it is a sort of just a um a re a repositioning of interest. Of course, Iran has taken away a lot of the focus from uh from what was Cuba before, the uh the the war with Iran, but it seems as though um with the sort of the uh the stasis that is taking place in the Middle East, as though the Trump administration has now renewed its focus on Cuba, which it perceives to be potentially an an easy win, and which is undoubtedly a card in the sort of legacy bingo for for Donald Trump, which has sort of been uh been central to his uh to the view of his administration in this his second term.

Rosie Wright 1:15

Yeah, I mean, just for wider context for us, might Cuba be sort of next Venezuela?

Jon Bonfiglio 1:21

Well, actually, it's really interesting you say that because a number of things have happened in the last few days, but one of them, which actually has been much more in the news in the last 24 hours, but has been going on for a few weeks, is um that the US has continued to push this line about Cuba being a state sponsor of terror. And a district court in in South Florida is preparing an indictment of ex-president Raul Castro, who's who's still seen as being the sort of living icon of the um of the revolution. And these are on charges of shooting down two aircraft in the 1990s. Now, why is this important? This is important because it's an action which is being understood as an attempt by the Trump administration to sort of give them legal cover for a possible intervention, which would sort of facsimile what took place with Nicolas Maduro on January the 3rd.

Rosie Wright 2:08

Yeah. I mean, Cuba's response, what is it doing? What actually can it do?

Jon Bonfiglio 2:14

Well, interestingly, its response has been um as confusing as the US engagement, where the US threatens one day and then offers a hundred million dollar aid package the next. Uh, one day the Cubans are saying that they will fight tooth and nail to defend the homeland, and then uh on the other, they say that um that they're open to negotiation. One of the curious things that has happened in the last few weeks is the emergence of this figure who we hadn't really known about before, Raul Guillermo Rodriguez Castro. Now, he is the son of Raul Castro, again, this this uh the ex-president who's being indicted, but we hadn't um yeah, he he he wasn't a sort of known figure at all, but he's become the sort of the central component in sort of liaison and negotiations with with the US administration. And as I hear very little was known about him before um before these before these conversations began, but he seems to be the the sort of the the new generational linchpin in discussions with the US administration.

Rosie Wright 3:12

Yeah, okay, and how are those discussions going? We heard that the CIA director's gone to Havana. I mean what do we think they're discussing?

Jon Bonfiglio 3:20

Well, uh euphemisms is is all that we hear. Um the the the the Cubans insist that they have no part in um in supporting terror organizations and in fact our uh sort of control the Northern Caribbean um to sort of deter those kinds of actions there. What was interesting about I think that visit is that it was actually the um uh the CIA, it was actually the um uh the the US administration that released photos of the of the visit and the meeting, and that was the first that we knew of it. So it was initially sort of a a story which was shared by them, that they sort of want the world to know that there are discussions to take place um uh alongside the threats. But notwithstanding, it is worth um uh reminding ourselves that the visit of a of a sort of sitting CIA director or chief to somewhere like Cuba is highly, highly unusual.

Rosie Wright 4:16

Yeah. I mean, for Cubans who are living through blackouts, we're seeing sort of pharmaceutical medicine medicine shortages, schools having to close uh for periods of time. What is the reality whilst all of this conflict and conversation is going on?

Jon Bonfiglio 4:31

Well, it's it's it's desperate. I mean, Cuba is now, this part of the world is now entering its hottest part of the year. There's there's no electricity to speak of. I mean, if if somebody gets a couple of hours a day, then then they're lucky. That means no in this extreme heat of sort of high 30s, there's no fans, there's no refrigeration. It also means that, of course, as we've um discussed before on Times Radio, for months now uh waste collection has ground to a uh ground to a halt. Uh food production also now, of course, because it needs fuel, barely exists, hospitals are unable to provide services or function. The truth is that Cuba has known great difficulty over the course of the last half cent half century, but nothing has come anything close to what it is experiencing uh today.

Rosie Wright 5:19

Thank you very much for the context, Jon Bonfiglio, Latin America correspondent speaking to us there about really the increasingly fraught relationship then between the US and Cuba.