SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. government on Thursday announced sanctions against Cuba’s state-owned oil and gas company in a move expected to increase tensions between the two countries.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio asserted that key assets of the company, known as Cupet, were “unlawfully expropriated from American owners years ago.”
He also accused Cuba’s government of weaponizing energy.
“While the Cuban people have suffered fuel shortages and blackouts because of decades of under-investment in critical infrastructure, Cuba’s Communist leaders have diverted energy resources to line their own pockets,” Rubio said in a statement.
He further noted, without providing evidence, that Cuban officials “resell countless barrels of scarce energy on the secondary market, hoarding energy supplies for its military, intelligence and repressive forces, and rationing energy as a tool of social control.”