Cuba, the turning point: the director of the CIA at the table with the island's intelligence services
Havana accepts aid ($100m) offered by the US
Key points
- John Ratcliffe (Director of the CIA) met with the leadership of Cuba's Interior Ministry.
- Energy emergency results in hospitals not being operational
- The UN alarm
An unimaginable scene, for decades. And yet it happened. In Havana itself. The Director of the CIA, John Ratcliffe, sat at the same table as the Cuban Interior Minister and the Head of Intelligence of the island.
The US State Department, as a prelude to the meeting with the CIA, issued a statement offering the island 100 million dollars in aid, accepted by the Castro regime on Thursday, in exchange for 'significant reforms of the Cuban communist system'.
The meeting between Ratcliffe and the Cuban government leadership, documented by photos released by the US intelligence agency itself, is so far the most important stage in the two months of opaque negotiations between Washington and Havana.
A stunted dialogue
Both sides announced their commitment to 'seriously address economic and security issues', just when the energy and food emergency is at its harshest: the US embargo has become suffocating over the past four months.
The day before the Boeing C-40B Clipper, the state plane, landed in Havana with an official delegation led by CIA director John Ratcliffe on board, the Cuban authorities had announced a catastrophic new report on the war situation. "We have absolutely no fuel . We have no more reserves,' Minister of Energy and Mines Vicente de la O Levy told Cuban television.
The crisis in oil and gas supplies is causing serious problems for essential services such as hospitals and transport. Cubans, increasingly at the limit of their strength, are demonstrating with cacerolazos, concerts of pots and lids.
