Extracts:
On the 11th of January 2021 -in the last and dying days of the Trump Presidency- Trump and his Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, cynically, vindictively and fraudulently placed Cuba on the US State Department’s List of countries that sponsor Terrorism.
This fraudulent and ridiculous identification of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism has only served to reinforce the effects of the illegal US blockade by increasing difficulties for Cuba to engage in international trade, to carry out financial operations, and to acquire basic staples for its people.
It is this terrible and undeserved state of affairs that prompted Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley to make the following Statement about Cuba during her 27th of September 2024 address to the United Nations General Assembly:
“And, Mr. President, you cannot come on this platform, regrettably, … and not have to ask for reprieve for the people of Cuba. It is unacceptable, it is unconscionable! And that it continues today is a mark on our international conscience. The Cuban people continue to face the most dire of economic circumstances, and this is directly as a result of its exclusion and its designation as a state sponsor of terrorism. And I have stated that our only knowledge of terrorism and Cuba is in fact the downing of the Cubana plane off the waters of Barbados, where Cubans, Guyanese and Koreans were killed. My friends, Cuba has been a valuable partner, stepping up for us when it has mattered most, by the provision of nurses and doctors in pandemics and by the provision of other essential workers when the global community needed it, and also when people needed to be liberated in southern Africa! The reality is that we must continue to have resolve in calling for the embargo to be lifted, and we will condemn it year after year after year because it is simply wrong!”
I, therefore, wish to conclude my address today by demanding -on behalf of the Government and people of Barbados, and indeed, on behalf of the entire Caribbean Community- that the Government of the United States of America must terminate its illegal blockade of Cuba and remove Cuba from the US State Department’s List of state sponsors of terrorism!
I want to remind the Government of the USA that every single year for the last 32 years, the overwhelming majority of the nations of the world have gathered at the United Nations and have passed multiple Resolutions that affirm that the US blockade of Cuba is illegal and that it must be terminated.
Indeed, on the last occasion that the Resolution was voted on, some 187 nations voted in favor of the Resolution, and only two nations, inclusive of the USA, opposed it.
President Biden: the governments and people of the Caribbean Community call upon you to display moral conscience, and to demonstrate respect for International Law and for the nations and people of the World community by taking immediate steps to end the illegal blockade and to remove Cuba from your unilaterally determined list of state sponsors of terrorism!

Ladies and Gentlemen, Brothers and Sisters, Comrades all: On this sacred “Caricom- Cuba Day Against Terrorism” I say to you: Viva Cuba! Viva Barbados! Viva Guyana! Viva Caricom!