When asked about Cuba by journalists last week, Donald Trump replied: ‘It may be a friendly takeover. It may not be a friendly takeover. It wouldn’t matter, because they’re really down to the fumes.’
It was the only the latest in a series of increasingly belligerent statements from the White House about the island 90 miles off the Florida coast. Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state and a Cuban-American himself, openly threatens Cuba’s communist leadership. Trump says ‘I can do anything I want with it’.
As Ruaridh Nicoll has been reporting for the Guardian, it comes after months of a US-imposed oil blockade of the island, which has left Cuba reeling from a series of blackouts. Shops are shuttered. Schools are on reduced hours. Tourists have stopped coming.
The Belly of the Beast journalist Daniel Montero, also in Havana, tells Nosheen Iqbal how ordinary Cubans are coping and what may come of continuing negotiations between Havana and Washington.