The national oil company said it is ‘not aware of, nor involved in, any such arrangement’ and has not entered into any related agreement or commitment. — Picture by Miera Zulyana
Sunday, 29 Mar 2026 12:47 PM MYT
KUALA LUMPUR, March 29 — Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas) has denied any involvement in a reported fuel supply deal linked to a local government unit in the Philippines.
The national oil company said it is “not aware of, nor involved in, any such arrangement” and has not entered into any related agreement or commitment.
It added that its immediate priority remains ensuring a reliable and continuous fuel supply for Malaysia, supported by established supply networks and close coordination with the government, it said in a statement today. — Bernama
MP SPEAKS | We are standing on the precipice of a global conflict and a global economic meltdown. The “Franz Ferdinand moment” of our time is unfolding in slow motion right in front of our eyes.
Now, more than ever, Malaysians must stand united. We must look at the gathering storm in the Middle East with open eyes, close ranks beyond all our divides, and face this threat as one nation.
The impact of the disrupted global energy order is already battering our region. Regarding the recent adjustment of the RON95 subsidy quota to 200 litres, I must be frank: this measure is not perfect, and it is certainly not popular.
I fully understand the anxiety of the people. The government may be far from perfect, but it is doing its absolute best to navigate this crisis within extremely limited fiscal space.
When we look at the reality around us, Malaysia is actually doing comparatively better than most of our neighbours.
The Philippines is currently in a state of emergency, with hundreds of petrol stations forced to close. Laos has had to shorten the school week by two days just to reduce fuel consumption.
Manila, the Philippines
In Indonesia and Thailand, fuel rationing has forced citizens to queue for hours, sometimes for miles, to secure highly priced diesel. Nations including Australia, Singapore, Thailand, and Cambodia are urgently appealing to Malaysia for fuel.
We must rally behind the country right now, because we are in this together. And we must do so urgently, because all of this regional chaos is happening before any major ground escalation in the Middle East has even occurred.
The devastating math of Budi95
We must ask ourselves a very sobering question: How long can the government realistically continue the Budi95 initiative if a wider war breaks out?
Before this recent crisis, our national fuel subsidy bill hovered around RM700 million a month. Today, as global oil prices surge amid the conflict, the Finance Ministry reports our monthly fuel subsidy expenditure has already skyrocketed to RM4 billion.
What happens to the current Budi95 mechanism if crude oil spikes to US$150 per barrel? Or US$180? Or US$200? At those projected price points, the true, unsubsidised cost of RON95 would easily breach RM5.00 to RM6.00 per litre.
A petrol station
To maintain the subsidised price of RM1.99, the government would be forced to absorb an astronomical difference. Our monthly subsidy bill could easily balloon from RM4 billion to RM10 billion or even RM15 billion a month.
No government in the world can sustain that level of fiscal burn without bankrupting the nation’s future, cutting essential services, or borrowing heavily. This is the stark economic reality heading toward our shores.
Trackable military escalation
This threat is not built on political rhetoric or empty diplomatic posturing. It is built on the trackable, physical movement of military assets.
Recent reports indicate the United States has already deployed thousands of marines into the region. Carrier strike groups and amphibious readiness groups are holding position. B-52 bombers have been deployed to regional bases.
The Pentagon is actively preparing for the possible use of both special operations forces and conventional infantry in Iran, while the 82nd Airborne Division is being readied as reinforcements.
The Pentagon, United States
That goes beyond routine signalling but screams like the architecture of a much wider, more devastating, irreversibly escalated war.
Simultaneously, Houthi forces have formally entered the war, opening a new axis of escalation. We must be clear-eyed about what this means: targeting the Bab el-Mandeb Strait is almost definitely Iran’s asymmetric answer to US escalation.
While Malaysia conducts a large volume of intra-Asia trade, we are deeply dependent on the Bab el-Mandeb Strait for our high-value trade with Europe and the Mediterranean.
Essential imports like industrial chemicals, manufacturing machinery, and automotive parts, as well as our critical palm oil exports, rely on this route.
With roughly 15 percent of global trade and 30 percent of global container traffic passing through these waters, freight rates have already surged, insurance premiums have tripled, and shipping delays are choking global supply chains.
The ‘Franz Ferdinand’ moment
The assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914 triggered the First World War, and the German invasion of Poland triggered the Second World War.
We are dangerously close to a point of no return. A true “Franz Ferdinand moment” in today’s context - the spark that transforms a regional crisis into a global conflagration - would likely be one of the following:
Direct US boots on Iranian soil
A mass-casualty strike on US forces triggering full retaliation
A simultaneous multi-front escalation (Iran+Houthi+Hezbollah+a Red Sea blockade)
Strait of Hormuz
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim noted this week that about 50 percent of Malaysia’s oil supply transits the Strait of Hormuz. Asia imports nearly 60 percent of its crude from the Middle East.
If Hormuz comes under deeper military contest while Bab el-Mandeb is simultaneously choked, the effect will not be linear. It will be a catastrophic energy shock rippling through shipping costs, inflation, and public finances. It will hit all of us through the same economic arteries.
A call for unity and de-escalation
That is why I am calling on the Malaysian government to use every bilateral and multilateral channel, including Asean, the OIC, and the UN, to push for immediate de-escalation. We must speak not as spectators, but as a nation with skin in the game.
I call on global leaders, civil society, and all peace-loving nations to align around one urgent objective: no boots on the ground in Iran. Tell Washington: do not turn what is already a regional war into a generational catastrophe.
Most importantly, my message is to the people of Malaysia. This is not the time for performative outrage or partisan point-scoring at home. I do not ask that every Malaysian agree on every policy detail. I ask that we recognise the scale of the danger before us.
If this crisis deepens, it will test every household and every business. If we are divided, we will be weaker than we need to be, and many will be crushed.
Unity is our strength. Unity is our shield. Unity is our national survival.
HOWARD LEE is the Ipoh Timor MP and a DAP central executive committee member.
An international media association has condemned what it described as a “violent assault” by Israeli soldiers who detained a CNN crew in the occupied West Bank this week.
A CNN team was reporting on the aftermath of an assault by Israeli settlers and the establishment of an illegal outpost near the Palestinian village of Tayasir on Thursday when it was detained by Israeli soldiers, the Foreign Press Association said on Saturday.
“The soldiers aggressively targeted the crew and Palestinian civilians present, pointing their rifles at them,” the FPA said, even after the journalists identified themselves.
“The soldiers repeatedly tried to infringe the CNN crew’s right to film, ordering the crew to stop filming and threatening to confiscate the camera.
“Later, an IDF soldier approached CNN’s photojournalist from behind, placed him in a chokehold, slammed him to the ground and damaged his camera,” said the association, which represents hundreds of journalists in Israel and Palestine.
CNN confirmed the details in its own report on the incident, identifying the photojournalist as Cyril Theophilos.
The FPA, which called for an investigation into the incident, said: “This was not a misunderstanding … It was a violent assault on clearly identified journalists and a direct attack on press freedom.
“The use of force was excessive and dangerous. Pointing rifles at journalists and civilians, physically assaulting a cameraman and detaining a crew are actions that cross every line.
“Such behaviour reflects a deeply alarming pattern of hostility toward the media and cannot be tolerated under any circumstances.”
The military said the incident would be looked into.
A spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces, Lt Col Nadav Shoshani, wrote on X: “The soldiers’ conduct and statements in this incident do not represent the IDF, go against what is expected of IDF soldiers and will be investigated.”
He added: “I apologised privately, and I will say it again – this shouldn’t have happened. Our job is to maintain law and order, among that is allowing for freedom of the press.”
The incident is the second such event involving CNN this month.
Days ago, during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, a CNN producer was left with a fractured wrist after an “unprovoked assault” by Israeli police officers.
That incident happened when journalists were documenting worshippers praying outside the walls of the Old City in East Jerusalem.
Violence in the West Bank has continued unabated even after the October 2025 ceasefire in Gaza, and since the outbreak of the current war in the Middle East, there has been a new spate of deadly attacks by Israeli settlers.
Demonstrators have hit the streets of cities across the United States for the first “No Kings” protest since the joint US and Israeli war against Iran began one month ago.
Saturday’s marches and rallies mark the third round of nationwide “No Kings” protests since President Donald Trump took office for a second term.
According to the “No Kings” website, more than 3,300 events were planned across all 50 states, with large crowds expected in cities such as New York, Los Angeles and Washington, DC. Parallel events are happening internationally in cities such as Rome, Paris, and Berlin.
Organisers, however, are aiming to rally voters outside of the US’s major metropolises, in areas that tend to skew conservative. They say that roughly two-thirds of participants are expected to take part in events outside of major city centres.
“The defining story of this Saturday’s mobilisation is not just how many people are protesting, but where they are protesting,” said Leah Greenberg, cofounder of the progressive nonprofit Indivisible, which started the “No Kings” movement last year.
The main event, however, was scheduled for the Minneapolis-St Paul area in Minnesota, known as the Twin Cities.
The midwestern state became a focal point for Trump’s hardline immigration crackdown in December, when he launched Operation Metro Surge.
That operation saw more than 3,000 of federal immigration agents descend on the Twin Cities, where they were accused of using excessive force to conduct deportation raids.
In January, agents shot and killed two US citizens, Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good, prompting nationwide outrage and calls for reform. Dozens of lawsuits have been filed as a result of the operation, which was wound down in February.
Saturday’s protest will commemorate those deaths in Minnesota, with speeches, concerts and appearances from activists, labour leaders and politicians.
Progressive Senator Bernie Sanders addressed attendees, and rock icon Bruce Springsteen performed at the event, along with folk singer Joan Baez.
“It is your courage and your commitment that have inspired all of us. You have shown the power of nonviolent protest,” actor Robert De Niro told the crowd in Minnesota in a pre-recorded address.
“You’ve shown bravery in the face of armed attack by government thugs, and you stood together and ran them out of town.”
Elsewhere, early on Saturday, marchers in Washington, DC, gathered around landmarks such as the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument, holding signs and waving papier-mache effigies of the Trump administration.
The previous two “No Kings” marches took place in June and October and drew millions of people. Trump responded to the October protest by posting an AI-generated video depicting himself dumping faeces on the protesters.
The US is currently in the midst of campaigns for its pivotal midterm elections in November, which will see Trump’s Republican Party seek to defend its majorities in both chambers of Congress.
Democrats, meanwhile, are hoping to gain seats as Trump’s popularity droops. Sanders was among the speakers who reminded protest attendees of the importance of the upcoming vote.
“We will not allow this country to descend into authoritarianism or oligarchy,” Sanders told the crowd in Minnesota. “In America, we the people will rule.”
'No Kings' organisers have made the metropolis of Minneapolis-St Paul, Minnesota, the site of their flagship protest on Saturday. [Tom Baker/AP Photo]
A demonstrator dressed up as 'Uncle Scam' attends a 'No Kings' protest in New York City on Saturday. [Jeenah Moon/Reuters]
New York Attorney General Letitia James and New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams were among the officials at the 'No Kings' rally in New York City. [Eduardo Munoz/Reuters]
A protester wears a paper crown to the 'No Kings' rally in Boston, Massachusetts, on March 28. [AFP]
In Washington, DC, protesters hold aloft a papier-mache head representing Trump in a crown. [Leah Millis/Reuters]
The 'No Kings' march was designed as a demonstration against what activists considered a swerve towards authoritarianism under Trump. [Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters]
It would be meaningless for Iran to remain a signatory to the international treaty as it “has had no benefit for us”, said Ebrahim Rezaei, spokesman for the national security commission of parliament, in a Friday night post on X.
Malek Shariati, a representative from Tehran, said that a priority piece of legislation has been uploaded in an online parliamentary portal and will be reviewed soon.
Politicians have not held any sessions since the start of the war on February 28.
According to Shariati, the legislation will withdraw Iran from the NPT, revoke a law that adopted nuclear restrictions linked with a now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, and “support a new international treaty with aligned countries [including Shanghai Cooperation Organization/BRICS] on developing peaceful nuclear technologies”.
Hardliners have previously demanded an NPT exit and a nuclear bomb in response to outside pressure.
If such a law is approved by the parliament, it would also have to be agreed by the Guardian Council – a powerful 12-member constitutional body, before being implemented by the government.
Iranian authorities continue to accuse the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of taking a politicised stance and being complicit in attacks against Iranian nuclear sites, charges the United Nations nuclear watchdog rejects.
(Al Jazeera)
Mohammad Mohkber, a senior adviser to the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and a former first vice president under late President Ebrahim Raisi, said on Saturday that IAEA Director Rafael Grossi is a “partner in crime” in blood spilled during the current war and the 12-day war last June.
“His political reports about Iran’s peaceful nuclear activities, lack of condemnation for aggression against our nuclear facilities, and now encouraging the enemies to attack Iran’s nuclear sites, will bring the country to irrevocable decisions,” he warned, without elaborating.
Grossi told US broadcaster CBS News in an interview earlier this month that no war has the capability to totally destroy Iran’s nuclear programme, “unless it was nuclear war and you go for destruction unfathomable, which we hope will never be the case”.
Fada-Hossein Maleki, a member of the national security commission of Iran’s parliament, said on Saturday he believes that Grossi has acted as an “agitator” for months in order to please US President Donald Trump. He said the nuclear bomb comment “violates all international norms and constitutes a provocative act”.
Electricity, steel become targets
Israeli and US forces significantly intensified their attacks on Friday, in some cases destroying infrastructure that will have long-term repercussions for Iranians and the country’s beleaguered economy that is struggling with an energy crisis and inflation rates of about 70 percent.
Warplanes bombed a yellowcake facility in Yazd and the Khondab Heavy Water Complex near Arak, and so far, at least three projectiles have landed in the vicinity of the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, prompting IAEA warnings about the potential for a major radiological incident.
Heavy air strikes also pummelled Iran’s steel giants, namely the Mobarakeh complex in central Isfahan, and the Khuzestan complex in western Ahvaz. Production lines and power plants feeding them were targeted, prompting the Ahvaz complex to announce suspension of production until further notice on Saturday.
The companies form the backbone of Iran’s non-oil exports, and were projected to rack up billions of dollars in revenue at a time when Washington is also trying to choke off Iran’s oil exports. Thousands of jobs may be at stake after major damage to the sites.
The bombing came after Trump twice announced delays on launching destructive attacks against Iran’s power plants, which he said would last until April 6. He has also claimed that negotiations with Iran “are going very well” as the two sides present conflicting positions.
Tehran has undergone two of its most intense nights of bombing, with overnight strikes into Saturday lighting up the night sky orange and also leading to temporary power outages across multiple areas. Some citizens reported smelling strong odours left from the detonation of the powerful explosives in the morning in some areas.
But almost the entirety of Iran’s population of at least 90 million has been unable for one month to freely communicate its experience with the international community since the Islamic republic has completely blocked internet connectivity. Only an intranet is operational to offer some basic services and limit the flow of information to state-run outlets.
The internet was totally cut off for 20 days in January, when thousands of protesters were killed during nationwide demonstrations that the government blamed on “terrorists” backed by the US and Israel. The streets of Tehran and many cities across Iran are now filled with armed state forces who have strictly warned against further protests.
State media outlets also continue to release videos of “confessions” from Iranians, including one on Saturday showing a crying girl with a blurred-out face, who said she was apprehended after filming missile strikes from the window of her family home and sending the footage to foreign-based media.
According to videos circulating online and state media reports, one of the strikes that targeted the Iranian capital overnight was directed at the Iran University of Science and Technology.
Some reports said a centre carrying out satellite-related research activities was bombed, but the university only said “research and educational buildings” were attacked, which also disturbed civilians in nearby residential areas and a hospital, but inflicted no casualties.
More major air strikes have been reported over the past day in Karaj and Shahr-e Rey near Tehran, as well as in Yazd, Shiraz, Tabriz, Bushehr and a number of other cities.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization does not include Ukraine; nevertheless and notwithstanding the objections of NATO members Hungary and Slovakia...
....the American-led military alliance insists on sending money and weapons to the Kyiv regime warring with the Russian Federation over territories whose people overwhelmingly identify as Russian. Former Dutch prime minister and current secretary general of NATO, Mark Rutte, has stated on multiple occasions that the military alliance would continue to help defend non-NATO-member Ukraine.
According to Ukraine’s newly appointed, thirty-something-year-old defense minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine has over two million draft dodgers and a quarter of a million active-duty troops who have gone AWOL.
So NATO is protecting a non-NATO country whose men refuse to fight.
NATO is assisting a Kyiv dictatorship that depends almost entirely upon conscription (including the violent “busification” of “recruits” after draft officers break into vehicles and homes with drawn weapons).
While the E.U. and NATO fight Russian authoritarianism by protecting Ukrainian authoritarianism, both institutions have remained relatively quiet as member states sustain actual attacks.
Seven months after Russia moved to annex the Russophone regions of Ukraine, the Nord Stream pipelines transporting natural gas from Russia to Germany were sabotaged and made inoperable. German, Dutch, and French energy companies own interests in the pipelines. Subsequent German investigations have identified a dozen Ukrainian suspects, including members of a Kyiv diving school where military personnel train. Several independent journalists have concluded that Ukraine’s military carried out the underwater demolition of the Nord Stream pipelines.
If Ukraine’s government was, in fact, responsible for the destruction of the pipelines, then Ukraine (a non-NATO member) destroyed property belonging to NATO members. Ukraine’s alleged act of sabotage cut off Russia’s inexpensive natural gas from most of Europe. (Prior to the war, Russia supplied 45% of the E.U.’s natural gas imports.) So the destruction of the pipelines has raised the cost of energy (and the price of finished goods transported within the Union) for European citizens. NATO continues to protect a nation that may have directly attacked members of the military alliance.
Similarly, Ukraine has caused an international incident with regard to the European-Russian Druzhba (which means, “friendship”) Pipeline that was jointly constructed to transport Russian oil to Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Germany, and the Czech Republic. Last year, Ukraine’s military bombed several pumping stations servicing the pipeline. This year, Ukraine’s government claims that Russia attacked the Ukrainian section of the Druzhba Pipeline (a claim the Russian Federation denies), effectively halting all deliveries of Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia. As both nations are almost entirely dependent upon this oil supply, the pipeline’s inoperability has created a major energy crisis for citizens of Hungary and Slovakia. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico blame Ukraine for the oil shutdown. Ukraine’s president/dictator Zelensky says he has no intention of repairing the pipeline. After Hungary and Slovakia blocked additional sanctions on the Russian Federation and a ninety-billion-euro gift (a loan that never needs to be repaid) for Ukraine’s regime, Ukraine’s military destroyed another critical transit node of the Druzhba Pipeline in Russia.
Orbán followed up by very publicly intercepting part of Zelensky’s alleged money-laundering operation running through Hungary. Foreign Minister Szijjártó revealed that Hungary had already confiscated Ukrainian “mafia” funds that included tens of millions of U.S. dollars, tens of millions of euros, and a few million dollars in gold bars. In addition, the foreign minister has alleged that several billion dollars worth of currency and gold have been transported through Hungary to Ukraine in the last two months. A former Ukrainian general who once oversaw Zelensky’s intelligence service and secret police was detained in Hungary in connection to the suspected money laundering. An angry Zelensky again threatened to send Ukraine’s “special military operators” to Prime Minister Orbán’s home.
In response to Zelensky’s increasingly belligerent behavior, Prime Minister Fico urged the European Commission to distance itself from Zelensky’s “outrageous blackmailing statements.” The best that the Commission could do was a short statement from its deputy chief spokesperson, Olof Gill, in which the Eurocrat clinically observed: “Specifically in relation to the comments made by President Zelensky, we are very clear as the European Commission that that type of language is not acceptable. There must not be threats against EU member states.” At the same time, E.U. leaders pledged to provide for Ukraine’s budgetary needs for at least the next two years.
Ukraine is effectively waging an economic/energy war against Hungary and Slovakia. Hungary and Slovakia are members of the E.U. and NATO. Ukraine is a member of neither. Nevertheless, the E.U. and NATO continue to take Ukraine’s side. It is as if “unions” and “alliances” mean nothing.
The U.S. House Judiciary Committee recently concluded that the E.U.’s Rapid Response System almost exclusively targets so-called “right-wing” and “populist” political candidates. The European Commission has extended its online censorship campaign to one week after Hungary’s elections, allowing Eurocrats to monitor and censor public conversations concerning the election’s legitimacy. While E.U.-funded NGOs work to oust Prime Minister Orbán, E.U.-funded censors will be in a position to label allegations of European election meddling as nothing more than “Russian talking points.”
Just as in Romania, Moldova, Germany, France, and the Netherlands, the E.U. will use its army of paid “influencers” and propagandists posing as “journalists” to manipulate the outcome of Hungary’s elections.
To “save democracy,” Brussels’s Eurocrats believe that they are entitled to choose each nation’s leaders.
They don’t want Orbán because Hungary’s current prime minister continues to block the E.U.’s funding for Ukraine.
Brussels would do anything for martial-law-holdover-president/dictator Zelensky and non-E.U. Ukraine.
But allowing the citizens of E.U.-member Hungary to vote for their own national interests? That simply won’t do.
Donald Trump said he was upset that European Nato countries had declined to provide material support to the US as it nears the fourth week of its ongoing war on Iran
US President Donald Trump has made several comments raising questions about his commitment to Nato’s Article 5, which states that an attack on one member is an attack on all. (EPA Images pic)
MIAMI: Donald Trump said on Friday the US does not “have to be there for Nato”, comments that again raised questions about the US president’s commitment to the mutual defense provisions at the center of the transatlantic alliance.
Speaking to an investment forum in Miami on Friday night, Trump said he was upset that European Nato countries had declined to provide material support to the US as it nears the fourth week of its ongoing war on Iran.
European allies were not consulted by the US on its decision to attack Iran late last month, and many leaders in the alliance opposed the action.
“We would have always been there for them, but now, based on their actions, I guess we don’t have to be, do we?” Trump told the audience.
“That sounds like a breaking story? Yes, sir. Is that breaking news? I think we just have breaking news, but that’s the fact. I’ve been saying that. Why would we be there for them if they’re not there for us? They weren’t there for us.”
The president has had a famously on-again-off-again relationship with the alliance, and he has at various points made comments that provoked questions about his willingness to adhere to Nato’s Article 5, which states an attack against one member state is an attack on all.
On the campaign trail in 2024, Trump famously encouraged Russian President Vladimir Putin to attack European Nato countries that did not pay their fair share on defense.
His relationship with several European leaders, however, appeared to improve over the course of 2025.
But Washington-Brussels relations again soured in 2026 after Trump ramped up his threats to invade Greenland, which is an overseas territory of Denmark.
The US is trying to remove President Miguel DÃaz-Canel and bring down Cuba's communist government using methods similar to the 1960s-era CIA, but such schemes failed then and won't work now
In the 1960s, the CIA tried to kill Fidel Castro with poisoned cigars, exploding seashells, and contaminated diving suits, as if knocking off the man at the top would somehow fix everything in Cuba. Today, US president Donald Trump is trying something similar, albeit with less extravagant methods. It did not work then, and it will not work now.
A stone-faced Miguel DÃaz-Canel, Cuba’s current president, recently admitted that the regime is negotiating with the reviled gringos. What he did not say is what everyone knows: the goal of the talks with the US, led by secretary of state Marco Rubio, is his own removal. The regime can stay, but DÃaz-Canel must go. Call it the “Nicolás Maduro extraction theory” of political change in Latin America.
But Cuba is not Venezuela. What “worked” in Caracas in January, when US forces swooped in and abducted the president, will not work in Havana.
In Caracas, Trump agreed to keep the thuggish Chavista regime in place, selling out the democratic opposition and dashing hopes of a democratic restoration, because there was something he wanted: oil. Cuba has no oil. It has beaches, and maybe Trump wants to build Trump Resorts on them, taking Cuba back to its pre-revolutionary days when New Jersey mobsters ran casinos on the island.
But, unlike oil, making money from tourism takes time and hard work. To survive, the Caracas regime first sold out Maduro and then agreed to do Trump’s bidding, with money from Venezuelan oil shipments deposited into administration-controlled Qatari bank accounts, no questions asked.
That is unlikely to be repeated in Cuba. Here a political insight from elsewhere in Latin America comes in handy. Brazilians distinguish “ideological” from “physiological” politicians. For all their bluster about “21st-century socialism,” the Chavista cadres were always physiological – interested above all in using power to line their own pockets.
In Havana, there is plenty of unfairness and corruption: all new luxury hotels, for example, are run by an outfit called Gaesa (Grupo de Administración Empresarial SA), which the Cuban military controls. But the Cuban Revolution was always about a lot more than cupidity.
Revolutionary fervor helps explain why the Castro regime has lasted 67 years, even though those decades of centralised control, bureaucratic rigidity, and hostility to private enterprise have bankrupted the island.
Maybe there is a Cuban Delcy RodrÃguez, Maduro’s vice-president who happily betrayed him, willing to forget the revolutionary fervor and strike a deal with Trump. But that person is yet to surface; in the meantime, loyalists remain very much in control.
The man reportedly carrying out negotiations with the US is none other than Raúl Guillermo RodrÃguez Castro – “Raulito,” as he is known around the island – a grandson of Raúl Castro.
That brings us to the main reason why getting rid of DÃaz-Canel will not change much: the man never had any real power. DÃaz-Canel has been president of Cuba since 2018, when Raúl, Fidel’s younger brother, ostensibly retired. But according to most reports, Raúl, now 94, and his descendants continue to call the shots.
Revolutionary upheavals often overthrow one oligarchy only to end up creating a new one. But this Caribbean betrayal of ideals must surely top all the charts: after almost seven decades of a revolution that was meant to disperse political power, Cuba is de facto still run by a single family, whose only recent achievement is to carry the surname Castro.
This consolidation of dynastic control is one reason why few people around Latin America are shedding tears over Cuba’s current plight. The New York Times asks whether Latin America is “ready to abandon Cuba,” but that question gets the story all wrong.
A few ageing revolutionaries still fondly recall Fidel in green fatigues chomping on a cigar, but the younger generation long ago abandoned Cuba as a lodestar for change. How many progressive young people can admire a regime that restricts access to the internet?
Obviously right-wing governments in Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, or El Salvador want nothing to do with Cuba. But Latin America’s three most populous countries – Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia – are run by leftists, and aside from repeating platitudes about self-determination, they are not lifting a finger to help the Cuban regime’s survival.
Fear of Trump’s retribution is not the only reason. In private, Latin American leftists concede that a regime that manages both to oppress and impoverish its own people cannot last forever.
But if covert democratisation is also Rubio’s plan for Venezuela, it does not seem to be working. Last week, RodrÃguez replaced defence minister Vladimir Padrino, a long-time Maduro ally, with General Gustavo González, who used to run the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (Sebin), Venezuela’s infamous intelligence agency. His expertise involves repression and torture, not political liberalisation.
In Graham Greene’s novel Our Man in Havana, expatriate vacuum cleaner salesman Jim Wormold becomes a British spy, but, lacking access to actual intelligence, he passes off drawings of vacuum cleaner parts as plans for secret weapons. When the scheme falls apart, British intelligence chiefs, fearing embarrassment, bestow honours on Wormold and pack him off to a comfortable retirement.
Maybe someday Rubio will also receive honours for his efforts. But Cubans are likely to get only fake plans, not the freedom they want and deserve.
