Cuba's state airline ending routes amid pressure by Trump administration

Cuba's state airline Cubana has announced that it is scraping flights to seven international destinations following US President Donald  Trump's economic sanctions and its latest move in pressuring companies to stop leasing planes to the national carrier.
 
The Trump administration said last Friday that it was revoking licenses of companies that lease passenger aircraft to Cubana and other state airlines of the Latin country, alleging that the airlines used the planes to take tourists to Cuba in violation of US sanctions.

Cuban state media revealed Thursday that companies in third countries canceled aircraft lease contracts with the country's airlines, forcing the cancellation of routes to the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Venezuela, Haiti, Martinique and Guadeloupe.

The move is also expected to affect domestic routes. Cubana has promised to refund the passengers.

The Trump administration ramped up pressure on Cuba on Friday, forcing all of America's airlines to cease flights to any Cuban city other than the capital Havana.

The suspension, which will go into effect on December 10, was announced by the Department of Transportation at the request of  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over Havana's support for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro amid unrest led by the country's US-backed opposition.

“In line with the President [Donald Trump]’s foreign policy toward Cuba, this action prevents revenue from reaching the Cuban regime that has been used to finance its ongoing repression of the Cuban people and its support for Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela,” a State Department statement said.

The move will affect all flights that are currently carried out from across the US to nine airports in Cuba, other than Havana.

The department gave 45 days to the airlines, among them, American, Delta and JetBlue, to cease those flight.

Washington also prohibited US-based cruise ships from visiting Cuba in June.

Havana denounced the new ban just hours after the announcement.

Cuban Foreign Ministry General Director Carlos Fernández de Cossio said in a tweet that Washington is not caring about the consequences of its actions.

"In an effort to punish Cuba's unbreakable rebelliousness, imperialism takes aim at regular flight service to various Cuban cities," de Cossio said.

"They don't care if they impact family contacts, the limited means of Cubans in both countries and unjust inconveniences,” he added.

In another move this week, the US banned its companies from leasing planes to Cuban government airlines.

PressTV-US hits Cuba with new sanctions over Venezuela

The United States says it is imposing new sanctions on Cuba over its support for the Venezuelan government.

Direct flights from the US to Cuba came as part of a detente that took place under former President Barack Obama, who reopened diplomatic ties after more than 50 years in 2015.

As part of the deal, while tourism remained prohibited under economic sanctions, a number of categories of permitted travel to Cuba were expanded back then.

The Trump administration, however, has reimposed many of those restrictions.

Sanctions against several countries across the world from China to Iran to Venezuela, are central to the Trump administration’s maximum pressure campaign, which is intended to force independent nations back away from their anti-imperialist approaches.

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