Havana, April 18 (RHC)-- The Government of Cuba has rejected the implementation by the Administration of Joe Biden of unilateral coercive measures against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

In a statement released through X, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez condemned the White House's intention to maintain the existing pressure measures and increase them with the explicit purpose of destabilizing the South American nation and provoke a change of government that would allow it to take control of the country's resources, which legitimately belong to its people.

Cuba's top diplomat demanded that the unilateral and illegal sanctions imposed by the U.S. and European nations be lifted and stop harming the welfare of the Venezuelan people.

"We reject, once again, the implementation of unilateral coercive measures against #Venezuela by the U.S."

During a public intervention earlier this year, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro denounced that as a result of the sanctions, Venezuela stopped producing 3,993 million barrels of oil, which "meant a loss for the country of 323 billion dollars."

He also blamed the U.S. for implementing economic sanctions against his government.   President Maduro detailed that up to that moment, the White House and a group of acolyte nations had imposed 930 unilateral coercive measures.

He qualified Washington's war against Venezuela as "a true economic genocide" and specified that the total losses of the national economy, public and private sector in terms of fall of the Gross Domestic Product between 2015 (when the U.S. declared Venezuela a threat to its national security) and 2022 were 642 billion dollars.

This Wednesday, Maduro Moros affirmed that unilateral coercive measures will not impede national development as the country has a diversified economic model that allows it to walk on its own feet.

Also on Wednsday, the president of the Venezuelan National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, denounced that the U.S. committed to issue a general license to authorize operations in the gas and oil sector and to authorize transactions related to the Central Bank of Venezuela, but failed to do so.

In coincidence with the U.S. maneuver, representatives of the violent opposition, among them María Corina Machado, Julio Borges, Leopoldo López and others called for more sanctions against the Venezuelan people.  The unilateral coercive measures deprived Venezuela of significant revenues, weakening salaries and social benefits to the detriment of the most disadvantaged sectors and diminishing the results of public policies designed to protect them.

The pressure measures by the U.S. and European nations constitute a flagrant violation of Venezuelans' human rights. In February 2021, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Negative Impact of Unilateral Coercive Measures on the Enjoyment of HR, Alena Douhan, denounced that these unilateral measures prevent Venezuela from purchasing medicines, vaccines, food, medical equipment, spare parts and other essential goods to guarantee the exercise of HR and hinder the reestablishment of public services.

He stated that they are in violation of international law and that their declared intention to provoke a social implosion and attempt to change the current Venezuelan government violates the principle of sovereign equality, constitutes an act of interference and affects international relations.