Before they met
From the ultras in Florida: Rubio will bring to the Vatican the pressure from the U.S. to force negotiations with Cuba
Rubio's visit
to the Vatican takes on a strategic dimension that goes beyond routine
diplomacy.
The Vatican has
a proven track record as a mediator in the relationship between Washington and
Havana: it was crucial in the Obama-Castro rapprochement of 2014, when Pope
Francis facilitated the secret channels that culminated in the restoration of
diplomatic relations on December 17 of that year.
According to USA
Today, some analysts interpret the visit as an attempt to recruit the
Vatican as a leverage point for pressure on Cuba.
Others point to
a bolder interpretation: that Rubio may be
seeking some form of Vatican diplomatic cover before any potential use of
force, preemptively silencing the only moral leader with global authority to
oppose a U.S. military operation on the island.
It would not be
a minor move. The Pentagon has accelerated contingency
plans for possible military operations in Cuba, and Trump stated on April 13: "We
can stop in Cuba after finishing this." A military operation in Cuba would
face a public and vigorous opponent in León XIV: the first pope born in the
U.S. has made it clear that he will not yield to pressures from Washington.
From a close observer
of the Pope
What Marco Rubio Actually Wants from Pope Leo XIV
https://www.thelettersfromleo.com/p/what-marco-rubio-actually-wants-from
The Cuban-American Secretary
of State, who built his Senate career on hawkish opposition to the Castro
regime, has long been the most aggressive voice inside the administration on
Latin America.
Should he be seeking a Vatican blessing for regime change in Havana,
the historical record makes clear how badly that misreads Rome.
Catholic engagement with
Cuba is no new project. It is a multi-pontificate priority that has produced
concrete results….
Three pontiffs in seventeen years brought a
clear message to the Cuban capital — the Cuban people belong to a global
Catholic family that will not abandon them to anyone’s geopolitical chessboard.
Pope Leo XIV stands inside that lineage. He
is also the first pope born in the United States, which makes the moral stakes
of any American military adventure against Cuba especially acute for him. An
American pope cannot stay silent while his own government involves itself in
another foolish military quagmire.
This is what Rubio appears to misunderstand. The Vatican’s diplomatic posture
toward Cuba is not a transactional asset that a Secretary of State can borrow
for a season of regime change.
The Holy See has spent six decades on a
commitment to dialogue, accompaniment, and the dignity of the Cuban people.
Pope Leo XIV will not hand that legacy over to a White House that has shown open hostility to
international law and to Catholic social teaching.
If
Rubio arrives in Rome looking for cover, he will leave empty-handed. The Holy
See has never been in the business of providing moral fig leaves for empire.
*********************
After their meeting
MARCO RUBIO: We discussed, I mean, we’ve provided $6 million of
humanitarian aid, U.S. humanitarian aid that was distributed by Caritas, the
Catholic Church agency. We’re prepared to do more. In fact, we’ve offered the
regime there $100 million
of humanitarian aid that, unfortunately, so far, they have not agreed to
distribute to help the people of Cuba.
So we did the hurricane relief, but we’re offering more. And
it’s the regime that’s not accepting it. It’s the regime that’s standing in the
way of it. So we discussed that, and we hope we can do it because we do want to
help the people of Cuba who are being hurt by this incompetent regime that’s
destroyed the country and the economy.
On Cuba Sanctions
REPORTER: Mr. Secretary, can you come
back to Cuba a little bit? The United States, including yesterday, are ramping
up sanctions against Cuba, the regime, and all that. With the exchange with the
Pope, did you feel any convergence of views on that, and on the U.S. policy?
MARCO RUBIO: Let me clarify something
for you. Our sanctions are against a company named Gaesa. This is a holding
company set up by generals in Cuba that has generated billions of dollars of
revenue, none of which benefits the Cuban people. Not one cent of it benefits
the Cuban people.
You understand this, right? I don’t
know if you know this. There’s the Cuban government, and they have a budget,
and then there’s this private company that has more money than the government
does. None of the money in that company goes to build a single road, a single
bridge, provide a single grain of rice to a single Cuban, other than the people
that are part of Gaesa.
So that’s what we’re sanctioning, is a
company that basically is taking anything that makes money in Cuba and
illegally putting it into the pockets of a few regime insiders. So that’s not
sanctions on the Cuban people, because the Cuban people don’t benefit from
Gaesa. It’s a sanction against this company that is stealing from the Cuban
people to the benefit of a few. And we didn’t discuss those sanctions
yesterday, but we imposed them yesterday, and we’re going to be doing more, by
the way.
Transcript:
Marco Rubio Remarks After Meeting Pope Leo – The Singju Post
https://singjupost.com/transcript-marco-rubio-remarks-after-meeting-pope-leo/
|
|
|
With help from Maggie Miller and Daniel Lippman |
|
Subscribe here | Email Daniella | Email Gigi Secretary of State MARCO RUBIO and POPE LEO XIV may have found some common ground this week beyond ironing out a
spat with the White House: humanitarian aid for Cuba. Speaking to reporters today in Rome, Rubio said the U.S. had provided
$6 million in aid to Cuba distributed by Caritas, the Catholic Church’s
relief agency. He added that Washington had offered $100 million more that
the government in Havana refused to distribute. “So we discussed that, and we
hope we can do it because we do want to help the people of Cuba who are being
hurt by this incompetent regime that’s destroyed the country and the
economy,” Rubio said. Leo didn’t directly address Cuba in public remarks, although the Holy See said in a statement that the pontiff
and the top U.S. diplomat exchanged views on a host of issues, including
“difficult humanitarian situations.” The Vatican and Washington are talking as President DONALD TRUMP has threatened that “Cuba is next” for military action. Last
week, he signed an executive order expanding sanctions
authority on Havana. On Thursday, the State Department issued new sanctions on one Cuban national and
two companies, as the U.S. maintains an energy blockade on the island nation. It’s not clear whether the White House is aiming for regime change or
economic reforms. A White House official pointed NatSec Daily to Trump’s comments that
Cuba is a failing country and that the U.S. “will be there to help them out”
when the regime collapses. But while the administration keeps up the pressure on Havana, Rubio’s
goodwill tour may ease the path toward humanitarian help. “This is important to show that we believe in the Cuban people,”
said JUAN CRUZ, who handled Cuba on
the National Security Council of the first Trump administration. Cruz
described the aid as “ancillary” to resolving the broader U.S.-Cuba tension
at hand, but said it was proof of concept for the Vatican’s role in the
conversation — particularly at a time when other mediators like Canada had
receded. “The church is a proven guarantor and a trusted party on both sides for
a long, long time,” he said. There are signals that the U.S. is pulling back from imminent military
action. Our own Kimberly Leonard and Nahal Toosi report the
president’s focus appears to be on diplomacy, like pushing Cuba to privatize
state-run businesses, allow in more foreign investment, increase internet
access and commit to buying U.S. energy. The Cuban embassy declined to comment. Cuban Deputy Foreign
Minister CARLOS F. DE COSSIO scoffed
at Rubio who he said “lashes out against the Cuban people with new measures
of collective punishment in its ruthless and genocidal war against Cuba.” Cossio also disputed Rubio’s aid claims, saying the U.S.
government had not delivered all of $3 million in aid it promised in October,
and that “no one in Cuba” has opposed receiving another promised aid package
of $6 million, “with due coordination.” The State Department directed NatSec Daily to a February announcement of its $6 million aid
package, which it said “the corrupt regime must simply permit.” CHRISTOPHER
HERNANDEZ-ROY, a 25-year veteran of the Organization of American
States, now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said
accepting any aid from the U.S. was “a historic shift” even if the amount was
small. “The Trump administration is clearly tightening the screws as much as
it can on the Cuban leadership to force some sort of negotiation that’s
favorable to the U.S.,” Hernandez-Roy said. “The danger is in the calibration
between putting enough pressure on that the regime feels that it must
negotiate, versus creating a systemic collapse in the country.” https://www.politico.com/news/2026/05/02/trump-cuba-policy-florida-00902686/ Aware that he needs lies to justify his criminal
outrage against the Cuban people, the Secretary of State for the Advancement
of the Cuban Armed Forces of the Republic of Cuba. #EEUU fabricates the fable of an alleged offer of aid valued
at 100 million or more dollars, pretending to deceive the people of #Cuba and the Americans themselves. Where are they, what would you dedicate
them to? What the anti-Cuban politician does know very well, as many people
do, because it is public information, are the figures in billions of dollars
that the U.S. economic war costs Cuba. He also knows the ruthless human
damage of that war, the limitations in income, technology, food, fuel and
medicine that it causes. It takes great cynicism to pronounce, without shame,
a declaration of supposed help in such a mendacious way. Has he been sincere
in the Holy See? |
