{"id":83452,"date":"2026-02-24T19:23:34","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T01:23:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/?p=83452"},"modified":"2026-02-24T19:23:34","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T01:23:34","slug":"will-caricom-help-cuba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/will-caricom-help-cuba\/","title":{"rendered":"Will CARICOM Help Cuba?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>And while CARICOM leaders meet in St. Kitts and Nevis, the ambassador is reaffirming <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/trash-piles-up-in-cuba-amid-trumps-fuel-blockade\/\">Cuba\u2019s strong ties with Belize and CARICOM<\/a>. Amid the U.S. pressure and the ongoing blockade, Ambassador Martinez says her country is prioritizing energy sovereignty and diversifying international partnerships to secure its future.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_83409\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-83409\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-83409\" src=\"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"Yahima Martinez Mill\u00e1n\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624-1300x731.jpg 1300w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m43s624.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-83409\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Yahima Martinez Mill\u00e1n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><strong>Yahima Martinez Mill\u00e1n, Cuban Ambassador to Belize <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cOur relationship with CARICOM and also with Belize is historic. We have a relationship for many years and while other see the region as a political, Cuba sees it as home. We recognize and this has been very important for us, the support that Caricom has given to CUBA in order to denounce and also eliminate the US blockade and that has been very important for us. And in the case with Belize, we share an exemplary cooperation for many years especially in health and technical training.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hipolito Novelo<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn terms of the external shocks, what structural or long term solution is CUBA pursuing to reduce this vulnerability?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-83410 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852-1300x731.jpg 1300w, https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/vlcsnap-2026-02-24-18h22m46s852.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>Yahima Martinez Mill\u00e1n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cWe know that the solution lies in energy sovereignty. That is the most important for us. We had a plan but during this situation we are accelerating all the propose in order to get the transition to renewal energy source. It is a technology that is high cost. It is difficult for us due to the blockage but now it is priority for our country.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Hipolito Novelo <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIs the Cuban government exploring new economic diplomatic partnership to navigate what you describe as US suffocation on the country?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Yahima Martinez Mill\u00e1n<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cFor many years, Cuba has worked in order to diversify our relations, our trade relations with the world mainly after the collapse of the Soviet Union. We are strengthening ties with the BRICS bloc for example. And also we are working, and we have some ties with some partners in Asia, Europe and also in Latin America. Additionally to that, we are updating our economic model that also include a greater participation of non state actors to enhance trade.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<h6>Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.<\/h6>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h4>Watch the full newscast here:<\/h4>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/zZbriTFOwYs?si=KresMFwrPhkPbTGI\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>And while CARICOM leaders meet in St. Kitts and Nevis, the ambassador is reaffirming Cuba\u2019s strong ties with Belize and CARICOM. Amid the U.S. pressure and the ongoing blockade, Ambassador Martinez says her country is prioritizing energy sovereignty and diversifying international partnerships to secure its [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":83408,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[449,444,475,523],"tags":[10978,10988],"class_list":["post-83452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-latest-news","category-news","category-regional-international","tag-2026-02-24","tag-will-caricom-help-cuba"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83452"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83452\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83453,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83452\/revisions\/83453"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greaterbelize.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}