First international aid convoy arrives in Cuba, medical equipment for hospitals

(Patria) - The first shipment of international aid for crisis-hit Cuba arrived in the country in the form of five tons of medical equipment, official sources said on Wednesday, AFP reported.

A delegation of about a hundred European activists arrived overnight at Havana airport with aid, which will be distributed to hospitals, sources said.

Cuba is in an economic crisis exacerbated by the interruption of oil supplies from Venezuela in January after the United States overthrew President Nicolas Maduro, a Cuban ally.

Now, 9.6 million inhabitants are struggling with the consequences of the US blockade of fuel supplies.

Aid activists from several European and Latin American countries, as well as Turkey, belong to the Nuestra America ("Our America") flotilla and want to show their solidarity with the Cuban people.

All in all, humanitarian organizations and public figures plan to deliver twenty tons of aid by air and sea to help Cuba overcome the worst economic crisis in three decades, worsened by the US arrest of Maduro and the interruption of oil supplies from Venezuela.

US President Donald Trump has threatened retaliation against any country that sends oil to Cuba. Official Cuban media reported that on Wednesday, another convoy left Chile with "medicines, supplies and food to help Cuba cope with the tightening of the energy blockade imposed by the United States".

In addition, a group of 140 people, including doctors, lawyers, union leaders and activists, will fly from Miami, Florida to Havana on Friday to deliver 2.8 tons of medical supplies to clinics and hospitals, according to the pacifist group CODEPINK, one of the organizers of the operation.

A flotilla from Mexico is also expected to arrive in Havana by the end of the week. Separately, left-wing activists are also planning to hold a solidarity event along Havana's coast. Among the expected participants are Pablo Iglesias, former Spanish politician and founder of the left-wing party Podemos, Irish punk-rap group Kneecap, Brazilian climate activist Thiago Avila and left-wing British parliamentarian Jeremy Corbyn, according to a statement from the organizers.

In their statement, the organizers quoted Corbyn as saying that the United States has blockaded Cuba for six decades and that "now Donald Trump's administration is intensifying it." Corbyn insisted that most people around the world stand with the Cuban people. Iglesias said that "defending the Cuban people means defending sovereignty and freedom from the criminal logic of the blockade" imposed by Washington.