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State Department admits it cannot rule out fuel diversion, according to 14ymedio
A State Department spokesperson said, in a statement obtained by 14ymedio, that it cannot be ruled out that there is “some diversion to figures or entities linked to the regime” of the fuel the United States exports to Cuba's private sector, while maintaining that the state monopoly has been broken.
The United States government admits that part of the fuel it exports to Cuba's private sector may end up in the hands of the government in Havana. “We cannot rule out some diversion to figures or entities linked to the regime, but we will continue to crack down on its efforts to evade sanctions, targeting any company that knowingly supplies the regime,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement sent to journalist David Adams and obtained by 14ymedio, in remarks translated by Yamacoa.
The same spokesperson maintains that the Cuban government “must now resort to subterfuge and illegality just to get a small part of the fuel that reaches the country, instead of controlling the whole market,” and says Washington's policy “has already brought about the largest privatization in the history of the Cuban economy,” in remarks translated by Yamacoa. By that account, private importers sell to other private businesses, to humanitarian organizations and to diplomatic missions.
The statement comes amid a push against shipments bound for the state sector. On 7 October, Department of Homeland Security agencies announced the seizure of 90 biodiesel shipments, 71 at Port Everglades (Florida) and 19 in Houston (Texas), worth close to $2.8 million and destined for the state-owned Enetec, added on 13 July to OFAC's sanctions list.
14ymedio recalls what it has been documenting since April: the leasing of state filling stations to private firms, or mipymes, to dispense fuel bought in the United States, and the sale of gasoline and diesel in dollars through the Ticket platform, run by Cimex, a corporation in the Gaesa military conglomerate that is sanctioned by OFAC. In September, the paper reported that the El Eficiente station was fueling vehicles of the state-owned Sepsa, trucks of Interior Ministry special brigades and State Security motorcycles.
An investigation by ADN Cuba and Martí Noticias published on Friday concluded that Cimex buys fuel from 21 suppliers, at least 16 of them mipymes, and resells it through its network of service stations, as well as supplying the Revolutionary Armed Forces Ministry. Among the documents cited is an invoice dated 21 September from Cimex-Mariel to an Oro Negro service station for more than 23,000 liters of gasoline.
From January to August this year, cumulative exports of petroleum products from the United States to the island came to $231.74 million, a figure without precedent in the commercial history between the two countries.
Sources: 14ymedio
Data updated: 2026-10-25T04:15:00.000Z