CIA Director John Ratcliffe met with high Cuban officers in Havana on Thursday, a CIA official stated, in a shock go to that comes amid extraordinary rigidity between the 2 international locations.
“Right this moment, Director Ratcliffe met with Cuban officers, together with Raulito Rodriguez Castro, Minister of Inside Lazaro Alvarez Casas, and the top of Cuban intelligence companies in Havana to personally ship President Trump’s message that the US is ready to significantly have interaction on financial and safety points, however provided that Cuba makes elementary adjustments,” a CIA official stated in an announcement.
Throughout the assembly, Director Ratcliffe and the Cuban officers mentioned intelligence cooperation, financial stability and safety — “all towards the backdrop that Cuba can now not be a protected haven for adversaries within the Western Hemisphere,” the official stated.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe meets with high Cuban officers in Havana.
CIA
In an announcement learn on the air by the state broadcaster, the Cuban authorities confirmed the assembly, saying the U.S. requested it.
“The data supplied by the Cuban aspect and the discussions held with the U.S. delegation made it attainable to categorically exhibit that Cuba doesn’t represent a risk to U.S. nationwide safety, nor are there reliable causes to incorporate it on the checklist of nations that allegedly sponsor terrorism,” the Cuban authorities stated in its assertion.
Emboldened by the U.S. raid that led to the seize of ousted Venezuelan chief Nicolas Maduro earlier this yr, President Donald Trump has more and more turned his consideration to a most stress marketing campaign on Cuba, warning of imminent motion for months.
In latest weeks, Trump has said that Cuba’s political system wants to vary “dramatically” and has repeatedly declared that the U.S. shall be “doing one thing with Cuba very quickly.”
Earlier this month, whereas talking in Florida final week, Trump stated that after the operation in Iran, “Cuba goes to be subsequent,” and that the U.S. shall be “taking on Cuba nearly instantly.”
Thus far, the administration has relied on financial ways to stress Cuba. In January, Trump announced a plan to impose additional tariffs on international locations that present oil to Cuba, declaring a nationwide safety emergency relating to the island nation.
Individuals take a look at a barricade arrange by residents protesting towards extended energy outages in Havana, Cuba, Wednesday, Could 13, 2026.
Ramon Espinosa/AP Picture/Ramon Espinosa
The blockade, slicing off Havana’s entry to overseas oil shipments, has deepened an vitality disaster on the island, pushing the county’s energy grid close to collapse, with huge blackouts.
On Thursday, amid the newest energy failure, Cuban Vitality Minister Vicente de la O Levy known as the state of affairs with the nationwide electrical system “essential” and stated, “We’ve completely no gas; we’ve completely no diesel.”
Earlier this month, the Trump administration imposed new sanctions geared toward members of the regime that the White Home stated had been “complicit in authorities corruption or severe human rights violations, or are brokers, officers, or materials supporters of the Cuban authorities,” in accordance with a fact sheet revealed by the White Home.
In an interview with ABC News last week, Cuban International Minister Bruno Rodriguez warned that the U.S. was on a “harmful path” that would result in a “massacre in Cuba” in response to Trump’s continued rhetoric about taking on the nation, and stated there had been “no progress” in talks between the 2 international locations.
