UN General Assembly Votes to Condemn U.S. Embargo on Cuba as Support Slips

The United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to urge an end to the decades-long U.S. economic embargo on Cuba. However, a U.S. lobbying campaign led several countries to vote against the resolution or abstain for the first time in years.

The tally was 130 in favour, including Canada, with 25 abstentions and 17 votes against, among them the United States and Israel. Last year's vote was 165 in favour, 7 against and 12 abstentions. Several Western countries, including Germany and Italy, abstained for the first time in many years.

The vote carries political weight, but only the U.S. Congress can lift the Cold War-era embargo. The 193-member General Assembly has adopted the resolution every year for more than three decades, with the exception of 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

U.S. envoy to the UN Mike Waltz said he was satisfied with the shift. "I'm satisfied that so many countries now, including major economies like Korea, like Germany, and others have shifted their position," he told reporters after the vote. He added that the number of countries changing position had tripled and that he expected the trend to continue.

Tensions between the two delegations rose ahead of the vote. Cuban and U.S. diplomats had shouting matches at the UN last week, and there was yelling and shoving on the floor of the General Assembly on Tuesday.

Waltz accused a Cuban diplomat of assaulting an American diplomat during Tuesday's exchanges. He said Richard Tur de la Concepción, a first secretary at Cuba's UN mission, will be expelled from the United States. "That Cuban first secretary will be on a plane out of the country back to Havana today," Waltz said. Cuba's UN mission did not immediately respond to questions about the expulsion.

Washington has maintained a trade embargo on Cuba for more than 60 years, and the administration of President Donald Trump has been increasing pressure after using the U.S. military in January to remove Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla said on X after the vote that the U.S. government was "once again isolated in its attempt to continue strangling the Cuban people and subjecting them to an act of collective punishment and genocide." He said pressure and a "media circus" would not prevail over "the force of facts and truth."

The United States has voted against the annual resolution since 1992, but abstained for the first time in 2016 under former president Barack Obama, as Washington and Havana built closer ties.

Cuba blames U.S. sanctions for its current crisis, the worst economic downturn in decades, marked by shortages of basic goods, collapsing infrastructure and runaway inflation. Last month, Trump said at the UN that Cuba was a failed state and that freedom would be coming to the island. Cuba's electrical grid also suffered a total collapse last month, leaving millions without power.