The Chinese government on Thursday demanded that the United States halt military pressure and legal actions targeting Cuba. The statement followed a move by US prosecutors to indict 94-year-old former Cuban President Raúl Castro on murder charges, a development that coincides with broader US efforts to target communist leadership in Latin America following a severe four-month maritime oil blockade against the island.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun stated during a press briefing in Beijing that Washington must stop using judicial tools and sanctions to threaten other nations. The geopolitical friction intensified after the US Southern Command deployed the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier strike group into the Caribbean Sea.
The legal case against Castro centers on a February 1996 incident where Cuban military jets shot down two unarmed civilian aircraft operated by the Miami-based group Brothers to the Rescue over international waters, resulting in four deaths. Details regarding the decades-old aerial encounter are highlighted in an indictment by US federal prosecutors.
Guo told reporters that the international community rejects unilateral coercion. The full text of the diplomatic warning was carried by the Global Times, which detailed Beijing’s official objection to western military deployment in the region.
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel rejected the criminal charges, calling the indictment a fabrication designed to justify external intervention. Local authorities have called for public demonstrations outside the US embassy in Havana, while the presence of the USS Nimitz has put local defensive units on high alert.