The Department of the Treasury of the United States announced this Thursday the imposition of sanctions against Fidel Ernesto Castro Calis, grandson of the former Cuban president Raúl Castro, within the framework of the economic, commercial, and financial embargo that Washington maintains over the island.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC, for its initials in English) has added Castro to its 'blacklist', along with several entities related to the Cuban state apparatus, including the Banco Exterior de Cuba (BEC), based in Havana, and Comercial Cupet, responsible for foreign trade operations for the import and export of goods and services for the oil sector.
In the same way, Nicarotec, Abapet, and Cexni, Cuban state companies dedicated to the management, logistics, and exploitation of strategic areas of the national economy, such as technical and industrial services, the supply of technological equipment for energy infrastructures, and the import of raw materials or machinery intended for the processing of nickel and cobalt, have also been subjected to sanctions.
The U.S. Department of Justice charged the former Cuban president in May 2026 for the shooting down in 1996 of two civilian planes in international waters belonging to the Cuban exile organization Brothers to the Rescue, an incident that resulted in the death of three Americans and one resident in the North American country.
Castro was accused --along with Lorenzo Alberto Pérez-Pérez; Emilio José Palacio Blanco; José Fidel Gual Barzaga; Raúl Simanca Cárdenas and Luis Raúl González-Pardo Rodríguez-- of one count of conspiracy to kill American citizens, two counts of destruction of aircraft, and four counts of homicide.
The latest package of sanctions arrives in a scenario of energy and commercial blockade imposed by Washington against the Caribbean island at the beginning of this year, which has further deepened the severe crisis that Cuba is going through, where blackouts have multiplied due to the shortage of electricity. The President of the United States, Donald Trump, signed a memorandum last week to extend the embargo for an additional year, until September 2027.