UN calls for removal of trade and economic embargo against Cuba

NEW YORK, Nov 1, CMC – Caribbean Community ((CARICOM) countries Thursday joined the majority of the international community in calling on the United States to end its decades’ old trade and economic embargo against Cuba.
The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted a resolution, piloted by Havana, calling for an end to the embargo that Washington imposed on the Communist Caribbean country ever since the late Fidel Castro in 1958 overthrew the Fulgencio Batista regime.
The UNGA by an overwhelming majority rejected moves by Washington to criticise Cuba’s human rights record, making it the 27th time that the 193-nation assembly has issued the call to lift the embargo imposed in 1962.
Isreal joined the United States in voting against the resolution that was presented by Cuba. Ukraine and Moldova did not vote on the resolution that was approved by a 189 to two margin with no abstentions.
Last year, the resolution calling for an end to the embargo was adopted by a vote of 191 to two.
Washington also failed to get support for eight amendments criticizing Cuba’s human rights record with the Donald Trump administration pointing to Havana’s repression of political opponents and curbs of freedom of expression as a reason for maintaining the economic embargo.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez described the Trump administration as a “government of millionaires that imposes cruel policies”, citing Washington’s treatment of migrant children separated at the border with Mexico and “locked in cages.
“The US government does not have the least moral authority for criticizing Cuba or anyone else with regards to human rights,” he said, telling the UNGA that the embargo was a “flagrant, massive and systematic violation” of human rights in Cuba.
US Ambassador Nikki Haley dismissed the vote on the US embargo as a “waste of everyone’s time” saying it does not address Cuba’s human rights situation.
“It’s one more time that countries feel they can poke the United States in the eye,” Haley said of the vote. But you’re not hurting the US when you do this. You are literally hurting the Cuban people by telling the regime that their treatment of their people is acceptable.”