Cuba’s government has protested as interventionist comments from the U.S. Embassy on the island following demonstrations against power blackouts and food shortages by hundreds of people in eastern Cuba. Cuba’s Foreign Ministry delivered a note expressing the complaint to the chargé d’affaires at the U.S. diplomatic mission in Havana, Benjamin Ziff.
FILE - Cuba President Miguel Diaz-Canel walks through the COP28 U.N. Climate Summit, Saturday, Dec. 2, 2023, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Small groups of protesters took to the streets in the eastern city of Santiago on Sunday, March 18, 2024, decrying power outages lasting up to eight hours and food shortages across Cuba. President Miguel Díaz-Canel also referred to protests in a social media post, though he did not specify where they occurred.
On Sunday, protesters took to the streets in the eastern city of Santiago decrying power outages lasting up to eight hours and shortages of food. State media confirmed the protests in Santiago, while the U.S. Embassy in Havana said there were also reports of protests in a number of other provinces across the island.