Cuba weaponising energy, US sanctions Havana state oil company

U.S. slaps sanctions on Cuba’s state oil company and accuses regime of 'weaponising' energy, escalating pressure on Havana as the Trump administration accused the Communist government of using energy resources to sustain repression and enrich its leadership. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday announced the designation of Union Cuba-Petroleo (CUPET), Cuba’s state-owned energy company, under President Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14404. Rubio said Like every resource on the island, energy has long been weaponized by Cuba’s Communist government as a tool of both repression and self-serving regime of kleptocracy. 
The US State Department alleged that while ordinary Cubans have faced fuel shortages and recurring blackouts because of decades of under-investment in infrastructure, the country’s leadership has diverted energy resources for its own benefit. The State Department warned that foreign individuals, companies and financial institutions engaging in transactions with sanctioned entities or operating in designated sectors of the Cuban economy could themselves face sanctions exposure. 
Under the sanctions, all property and interests in property belonging to CUPET that are in the United States or under the control of U.S. persons will be blocked and must be reported to the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). The restrictions also prohibit transactions involving the sanctioned entity unless specifically authorised by OFAC.
Cuba has rejected those allegations and has said US sanctions on the island amount to “genocide”. “The sanctions against CUPET are part of a plan to strangle... Cuba, which has a direct impact, in a criminal way, on the Cuban people. Stop the collective punishment against children, pregnant women, the chronically ill, the elderly and the rest of the people of Cuba,” said Lianys Torres, Cuba’s top diplomat in Washington.
The United Nations’ human rights chief underscored those concerns earlier this week, warning the US sanctions were causing “widespread harm to the population and endangering lives”. The UN says the US measures are a violation of international law and amount to “energy starvation”, crippling public services such as the provision of food, water and electricity to the population and undermining the human rights of all Cubans.