Trump’s total blockade buries Cuba in rubbishOil cut-off triggers economic freefall, leaving streets clogged and crippling food.People in this town east of Havana are plunged into darkness daily and forced to cook with coal and firewood, but not everyone can afford this new reality.
Kenia Montoya said she recently ripped the wooden door off her bathroom in the crumbling cinderblock home that she shares with her children because she needed firewood, and they needed to eat.
Outside a decrepit colonial mansion in Havana where clothes hang from its iron balcony, the hot Cuban sun beats down on an enormous pile of rubbish on the street corner…. People walk by and empty bags onto the growing mound while others pick through the plastic packaging and cardboard boxes, hoping to find something of use. The stench rises as food putrefies in the Caribbean heat.
Like much else in Cuba, the bin collection has ground to a halt in recent weeks as the island spirals into an economic freefall.
In the capital, only 44 of Cuba’s 106 rubbish trucks can operate, following Donald Trump’s ban on oil or money reaching the island’s shores.
After the capture of Nicolas Maduro, the former leader of Venezuela and long-time ally of Havana, the country went from receiving 35,000 barrels of oil a day to none, pushing it into a full-blown crisis.
Not satisfied, Mr Trump is now reportedly considering a naval blockade to bar shipments reaching the island.
He is backed by Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, who, like most Cuban-Americans, is vehemently opposed to Fidel Castro and his legacy.
Alexei, 72, a retired chemistry teacher who studied in the Soviet Union, told The Telegraph that the blockade is “killing the people at a slow burn”.
With oil reserves and food drying up, blackouts lasting up to 24 hours have shuttered businesses and hospitals.
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