CUBA’S Ambassador to Jamaica, Yuri Gala Lopez, has lashed out at the United States for again opposing a United Nations resolution, which seeks to end the blockade that the North American country has imposed on the Socialist country since 1959.

Gala Lopez said that the continued blockade by the United States was only resulting in more hardships for the Cuban people.

“The blockade will never succeed in breaking the political will of the Cuban people to preserve our independence and sovereignty,” Gala Lopez said.

“Cubans refer to it not as an embargo, but as a blockade — which is wider than an embargo. There is clear proof that the battle for the lifting of the blockade has recognition and support of a vast majority of the international community. There is an emerging consensus that it is unjust, unfair and illegal.

“The blockade is the main hindrance to Cuba’s further economic and social development,” Gala Lopez said.

The ambassador said that the north Caribbean island was willing to engage the United States in dialogue centred on getting both countries on firmer ground, but added that not much progress was being made from the end of the US.

“My government through the foreign minister and the President have said, and we have reiterated, that Cuba is willing to hold respectful dialogue. Cuba has been trying to normalise relations with the US.

In the meantime, US citizens are still prohibited from travelling to Cuba, save for very strict expectations.

“Extra-territorial applications have been reinforced, as proven by the strengthening of the sanctions and persecution against third countries’ citizens, institutions and companies which established or intend to establish economic, commercial or financial relations with Cuba.

“The reality is that it has been reinforced during this Obama administration,” Gala Lopez said.

The UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly for the United States to lift the blockade on Cuba, but the US objected for the 22nd straight year.

At the end of the November 14 vote, 188 of the 193 countries that make up the UN General Assembly voted for an end to the blockade.

The United States, Israel and Palau voted against it, while the Marshall Islands and Micronesia abstained.

Last year 186 countries voted for a lifting of the blockade.

The US has said that it would lift the blockade when Cuba carries out major economic and social reforms.

Cuba’s foreign minister Bruno Rodrigues told the UN General Assembly he likened the blockade to genocide, while describing it, too, as “inhuman, and amounted to a failed anachronistic policy of 11 successive US administrations”.

The US pushed for sanctions soon after Fidel Castro and his men overthrew Cuban right-wing dictator Fulgencio Batista on January 1, 1959, but the full embargo was imposed in 1962.

Batista served as Cuba’s elected President from 1940-1944, when he moved to the US, but later returned in 1952 when he preempted the general election by leading a military coup after it appeared that he would have lost the election. He was ousted on New Year’s Day, 1959. He fled to Portugal and died in Spain in 1973, aged 72.

Gala Lopez also came out strongly against a decision by the US to label Cuba as a nation that supports terrorism.

“Cuba rejects the recent decision by the US Government to include Cuba in the US State Department’s list of countries which sponsor international terrorism. We think that they do that with the sole purpose of discrediting Cuba and continuing to justify the policy of blockade against Cuba.

“We think that the US Government does not have any authority to judge Cuba in such a way. Cuba has an unblemished record in the fight against terrorism and has been unfortunately the victim of the scourge of terrorism.

“Over 3,000 Cubans have been killed since 1959 due to terrorist action. More than 2,000 have been maimed as a result of those terrorist actions, arranged, organised and funded from US territories.

“We demand that the US Government put an end to this shameful practice of the manipulation of this issue, which offends the Cuban people,” said Gala Lopez, who also urged the US to free the ‘Cuban Five’, who were being held on claims that they were involved in terrorist acts on behalf of the Cuban authorities.