US-Cuba relations

Cuba's top diplomat to the United States says recent sanctions targeting the island's leadership and the indictment of former President Raúl Castro are a "pretext" for the Trump administration to persuade the American people to support a U.S. military intervention in Cuba.

Amid a deepening economic crisis and U.S. pressure, Cuba’s Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister, Josefina Vidal Ferreiro, strongly pushed back against Trump administration allegations that the island poses a national security threat to the United States.

Adys Lastres Morera, a Cuban national and lawful U.S. permanent resident living in Miami, was taken into custody this week by ICE agents because the government says she “poses a threat to the United States and undermines American foreign policy interests.”

The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of owners of Cuban property that was confiscated by Fidel Castro's government more than 65 years ago. By an 8-1 vote Thursday, the justices revived claims filed by a U.S. company, Havana Docks, that operated docks in the Cuban capital. The suit targets four cruise lines that brought tourists to Cuba during the brief thaw in relations during the Obama administration.

A top Cuban government official wrote on X that "#Cuba neither threatens nor desires war."

The officials involved in preliminary discussions with Cuban authorities also told The Associated Press that they are not optimistic the communist government will accept an offer for tens of millions of dollars in humanitarian aid.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday again blasted the Cuban government, labeling it a "failed state" run by "incompetent communists."

Farming equipment is falling silent across Cuba, with no fuel to power it. As a result, poverty is deepening and hunger is increasing across Cuba, a country of nearly 10 million people.

The vote on the war powers resolution showed how Republicans continue to stand behind Trump as he acts unilaterally to exert American force in a range of global conflicts.

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel told NBC News’ Meet the Press that he would not step down in his first interview with a U.S. network, a portion of which was broadcast Thursday.

The Cuban government says it will release 2,010 prisoners in a move that comes while the Trump administration puts extreme pressure on the island's government with a suffocating oil blockade. The announcement Thursday said the pardons were a "humanitarian gesture" in connection with Holy Week and didn't mention mounting pressures with the U.S. The government said the prisoners affected are foreigners and Cubans but didn't name them.

Cuba's deepening economic crisis is pushing struggling families into hunger and forcing them to rely on donations and the black market. One Havana mother says she sometimes has no lunch for herself and her daughters, as fuel shortages, daily blackouts and cuts to rationed food impact families across the island.