Cubans stage rare protests amid persisting economic crisis
Al Jazeera
President points finger at US after hundreds of people demonstrate against food shortages and blackouts.
Rare protests have taken place in Cuba as the island nation’s economic crisis persists.
President Miguel Diaz-Canel called on Monday for calm, and hit out at the United States after hundreds of people gathered in Santiago the previous day to demonstrate against power blackouts and food shortages.
Social media videos showed crowds in the communist-governed country’s second-largest city chanting, “Power and food”.
A wave of blackouts has recently seen power supplies cut for up to 18 hours or more in a day. That has helped jeopardise food supplies and economic activity in the cash-strapped country.
Long stymied by US trade embargoes and more recently sanctions imposed during Donald Trump’s presidency, Cuba is battling its worst economic crisis in decades, caused in part by the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw the flow of much-needed tourism dollars plunge.
