Russia deepened its alliances with communist Cuba and socialist Venezuela this week, formalizing military and strategic agreements that strengthen Moscow’s foothold in the Western Hemisphere and directly challenge U.S. influence.
A caravan of roughly 1,200 migrants—mostly from Cuba—is trekking north through southern Mexico, but unlike those in years past, this group isn’t heading for the U.S. border.
Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry announced plans to open four new embassies in Latin America by the end of 2025, targeting Panama, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, and Uruguay. The expansion will also include over ten new consular offices across Europe. This diplomatic push will be partially funded by a reduction in Ukraine’s operations in Cuba.
Top leaders of Cuba’s communist regime, including figurehead Miguel Díaz-Canel, were hit with new U.S. visa restrictions Friday on the fourth anniversary of the July 11, 2021 anti-communist protests. The State Department sanctioned key officials for their roles in the violent repression of peaceful demonstrators, holding them accountable for grave human rights abuses.
Cuba’s figurehead leader Miguel Díaz-Canel delivered a fiery anti-American speech Sunday at the BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro, attacking President Donald Trump’s renewed sanctions on the island’s communist regime and celebrating Cuba’s status as a “partner” in the anti-Western coalition.
The communist regime in Cuba is reportedly preparing a ten-year prison sentence for Alexander Verdecia, a 51-year-old Christian dissident and member of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), over Facebook posts critical of the government. Martí Noticias reported Tuesday that Verdecia remains imprisoned without a trial date at Las Mangas prison in Bayamo under harsh conditions.
The communist regime in Cuba has formally warned the top U.S. diplomat in Havana, Mike Hammer, accusing him of “interfering” in the country’s internal affairs. The regime’s protest note, delivered Friday, claims Hammer is “inciting Cubans to commit serious criminal acts” by meeting with political dissidents, religious leaders, and families of political prisoners.
The Cuban communist regime has released Evangelical pastor Luis Guillermo Borjas from custody, but both he and his wife, Pastor Roxana Rojas, still face charges of “contempt” and “disobedience” in a Cuban military court on June 9. Their crime? Defending their son, Kevin Lay Laurencio Rojas, a young man facing trial for deserting the regime’s brutal, compulsory military service.
