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Rogelio Sierra Diaz

Herald Reporters
Cuba will continue to strongly condemn the illegal sanctions imposed on Zimbabwe by the United States and its western allies, Cuban Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Mr Rogelio Sierra Diaz said yesterday.

Mr Diaz said this after paying a courtesy call on Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa in Harare yesterday.

Mr Diaz said Cuba would continue to maintain firm relations with Zimbabwe regardless of his country’s ongoing reconciliation process with the United States of America, its erstwhile foe.

“We have explained to the Vice President the reasons why we are visiting Zimbabwe,” said Mr Diaz.

“One of the things that I have communicated to the Vice President that I will keep on conveying to the other Zimbabwean authorities with whom I will have meetings with, is that the new circumstances concerning the relations between United States and Cuba will never represent an element that will affect the relations of Cuba and other African nations,” he said.

“And of course these will not have any impact either on our relations with our sister nation of Zimbabwe because Cuba will not renounce its principles, it will not abandon its international projections and of course it will never abandon its friends or its family.”

Mr Diaz said his visit to Zimbabwe was also aimed at reviewing the relations between the two countries as well as to highlight the friendship, solidarity and the historical bonds that have existed between the two countries. He said Cuba was more than willing to continue working on strengthening of the existing relations. Mr Diaz also said he was grateful for Zimbabwe’s unwavering solidarity with the Latin American country by campaigning for the lifting of the US blockade and the release of political prisoners.

Cuba has endured over half a century of crippling illegal sanctions from the same imperial powers that have imposed punitive measures against Zimbabwe.

Only recently US president Barack Obama announced a policy shift which has seen sanctions against Cuba being lifted or relaxed.