US Seeks to Affect Cuba's Revenue by Banning Charter Flights

President Donald Trump administration Friday announced that all public charter flights departing from the United States to Cuba will be banned, except those directed to Havana.

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"At my request, the Department of Transportation (DOT) suspended all public charter flights between the United States and Cuban destinations other than Havana’s Jose Marti International Airport," the U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.

"DOT will impose an appropriate cap on the number of permitted public charter flights to Jose Marti International Airport."

With these measures, the Trump administration further dismantles the normalization of bilateral relations that President Barack Obama (2009-2017) began to implement and that contributed to a considerable increase in U.S. tourism.

Between 2017 and 2018, more than 1.1 million U.S. citizens, including some 500,000 Cuban-descendent citizens, traveled to the Caribbean island.​​​​​​​

As of January 2017, however, Trump changed the policy of approach for hostility measures towards Cuba, which is reflected in a resurgence of the blockade imposed by Washington almost 60 years ago.

As can be seen in the State Department's press release, the U.S. foreign policy explicitly seeks to generate an economic crisis in Cuba by reducing its tourism-revenue.

“Today’s action will further restrict the Cuban regime’s ability to obtain revenue,” Pompeo states.

“In suspending public charter flights to these nine Cuban airports, the U.S. further impedes the Cuban regime from gaining access to hard currency from U.S. travelers,” he added.

The Trump administration's economic bullying has also another explicit goal: to prevent Cuba from continuing its "unconscionable support" for Venezuela's Bolivarian revolution. ​​​​​​​