US sanctions Cuban security chief and special forces over crackdown on protests

Biden moves to pressure government over alleged human rights abuses amid biggest demonstrations in decades.

Cuban Americans participate in a demonstration to show support for protesters in Cuba, in front of the Versailles restaurant in Miami on Wednesday.

The US has imposed sanctions on a Cuban security minister and an interior ministry special forces unit for alleged human rights abuses in a crackdown on anti-government protests this month.

The move marked the first concrete steps by Joe Biden’s administration to apply pressure on Cuba’s Communist government as it faces calls from US lawmakers and the Cuban American community to show greater support for the biggest protests to hit the island in decades.

The speed with which the administration has crafted new sanctions further signals Biden is highly unlikely to soften the US approach to Cuba any time soon after his predecessor, Donald Trump, rolled back a historic Obama-era détente with Havana.

“This is just the beginning,” Biden said in a statement, expressing condemnation for “mass detentions and sham trials”.

“The United States will continue to sanction individuals responsible for oppression of the Cuban people,” he said.

The Cuban foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez, in a message on Twitter, rejected the sanctions as “unfounded and slanderous” and urged the US to apply such measures to its own record of “systematic repression and police brutality”.

The treasury department said the sanctions had been placed on an entire interior ministry security unit and on Gen Alvaro López Miera, minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, describing him as leader of an entity “whose members have engaged in serious human rights abuse”.

Thousands of Cubans staged protests a week ago to demonstrate against an economic crisis that has brought shortages of basic goods and power outages. They were also protesting against the government’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and curbs on civil liberties. Hundreds of activists were detained.

Biden had promised during the 2020 campaign to reverse some of Trump’s Cuba policies, but Thursday’s announcement suggests little appetite for a return to rapprochement.

At the same time, the administration says it is still seeking ways to ease the humanitarian plight of the Cuban people.

The White House said on Tuesday that Biden would form a working group to examine remittances to Cuba in the wake of the protests. The aim is to determine how Cuban Americans can send money to families on the island while keeping the funds out of the hands of the Cuban government.

Trump had imposed tight restrictions on remittances, which are believed to have previously amounted to several billions of dollars annually.

The White House, in a statement, cautioned that the remittances issue was complex and “requires a measured and thoughtful approach in coordination with experts”.

Biden reiterated on Thursday that his administration was looking for ways to help ordinary Cubans regain internet access after Havana restricted access to social media and messaging platforms including Facebook and WhatsApp.

“We will work closely with our partners throughout the region, including the Organization of American States, to pressure the regime,” Biden said.

The Cuban government has blamed the protests mostly on what it calls US-financed “counter-revolutionaries” exploiting economic hardship caused by U.S. sanctions.

The sanctions were imposed under the Global Magnitsky Act, used to punish human rights violators with US asset freezes and bans on travel to the US.

But US officials have acknowledged that Cuban officials rarely have US financial dealings and seldom travel to the US, limiting the practical impact of such measures.

The unrest appears to have injected a new sense of urgency into Biden’s broad Cuba policy review, which began shortly after he took office in January. Until now, Cuba had not been treated as a top agenda item while the administration dealt with the economic recovery and coronavirus pandemic at home and challenges such as China, Russia and Iran abroad.