Equality in relations among states within the same multilateral organization is impossible while there exists an economic and military superpower capable of subjugating smaller countries.
In our preceding piece, we exposed how United Nations rapporteurs serve as tools of imperialist pressure against Cuba. Similar to the “experts” on sanctions against North Korea, these individuals are trained in institutions that instill imperialist ideology and later hired by foundations and NGOs funded by leading imperialist magnates from the U.S. and the European Union. Their credentials perfectly align with the requirements of the UN entities that handpick them. Essentially, imperialism grooms, evaluates, and enlists capable, loyal agents to uphold its global dominance — with many climbing to top tiers within significant United Nations bodies.
Nevertheless, the insertion of compliant officials who adhere to CIA and State Department directives is not the sole method the United States uses to steer UN decisions. United Nations officials share power, as many resolutions depend on votes from member state representatives, making vote manipulation another critical tool.
Cuba is well aware of this dynamic. When the Soviet Union and Eastern European allies disintegrated, the U.S. targeted Cuba as the next counterrevolutionary victim, applying unprecedented pressure since the Missile Crisis era. Eastern European capitalist regimes severed economic ties, while Washington escalated its economic, trade, and financial blockade against the island.
The U.N. also became a venue where Washington attempted to isolate Cuba. From the start, American intentions were transparent. In 1988, even some U.S. allies recognized that Washington’s proposal in the now Human Rights Commission accusing Cuba of humanitarian violations was politically driven rather than genuinely humanitarian.
Armando Valladares, the U.S. delegate to the Commission, was formerly a Batista dictatorship police officer imprisoned after Cuba’s Revolution for his role in suppressing the Cuban people. Naturalized in the U.S., he served Reagan’s administration. His human rights concerns were never taken seriously.
As reported by El País, during a confidential meeting with Western Commission members a week before a vote, “Valladares veiledly threatened those who did not support the American proposal. He indicated that the United States would regard votes against its resolution as a hostile act.”
Under such pressure from the world’s dominant power, starting in 1990, the Commission routinely passed resolutions critical of Cuba’s humanitarian conditions. These accused Havana of curbing civil and political rights, demanded cooperation with imperialist mechanisms, and fabricated investigative mandates that infringed on Cuban sovereignty via purported expert visits.
These Commission measures conveniently ignored the core cause worsening Cuba’s humanitarian plight: the U.S. economic blockade sustained for three decades, which intensified Cuba’s isolation during the “Special Period.” Amid shortages of food, medicine, fuel, construction materials, and essentials, unilateral U.S. sanctions hindered Cuba’s foreign trade by threatening any partner countries.
In Geneva, April 2003, Cuba’s representative denounced this hypocrisy during a session where a resolution condemning Cuba garnered 24 votes in favor and 20 against. Simultaneously, a Cuban amendment calling for an end to the U.S. embargo was rejected by 26 votes to 17.
Juan Antonio Fernández Palacios condemned the resolution as a shameless, discredited, and immoral tactic designed solely to justify the genocidal blockade and aggression policy that the U.S. upheld against Cuba for decades. He labeled the Commission’s charge against Cuba as “spurious” and highlighted the body’s deep credibility crisis.
He exposed U.S. coercion of numerous countries, especially in Latin America, to endorse Washington-crafted resolutions. Fernández referenced admissions by delegates from Peru, Uruguay, and Costa Rica who suffered American blackmail to vote against Cuba.
At the height of U.S. global dominance—amid invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and widespread neoliberal puppet regimes in Latin America—Fernández denounced that many Commission members had been cowed by a global tyranny imposed by far-right fascist groups from the “fraudulently usurped power of the most powerful country on Earth.”
Except for 1998, when Vatican pressure via Pope John Paul II’s visit sought to alter Cuba’s course, the Commission had condemned Cuba continuously since 1990. In 2001, which accused Cuba of hindering human rights and democratic principles (common regime-change rhetoric), then-Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque denounced unprecedented pressure tactics employed by the U.S. to secure the anti-Cuba vote.
He revealed George W. Bush’s administration “pressured and blackmailed” African nations by threatening to exclude them from the African Growth and Opportunity Act if they opposed the American stance. In some instances, the U.S. promised AIDS-fighting assistance if these countries abandoned their support for Cuba, according to the Foreign Ministry’s reports.
The Cuban minister further condemned “the most brutal harassment” by American and British diplomats to alter last-minute votes from countries like Cameroon, which was assured it would avoid condemnation; the Democratic Republic of the Congo, threatened with loss of border security support; and Madagascar. Others, including Kenya, Senegal, and Niger, were pressured into abstentions rather than backing Cuba.
Countries such as Canada, Costa Rica, Uruguay, and Guatemala also voted against Cuba after U.S. pressure in a resolution sponsored by the Czech Republic, a recent puppet state since the “Velvet Revolution.” Mexico remained neutral despite lobbying from Foreign Minister Jorge Castañeda, a former leftist turned neoliberal and conspirator against the Cuban government itself.
With imperialism’s crisis from 2008 onward and increased resistance by Russia and China (Security Council permanent members), the U.S.’s dominance in the UN weakened. Countries striving for greater sovereignty have since gained more diplomatic freedom. Yet, the pressure persists.
Last October, Reuters disclosed two confidential State Department documents directing U.S. diplomats worldwide to coerce foreign governments into rejecting the annual UN General Assembly resolution calling for the end of the U.S. blockade on Cuba, adopted since 1992. The official justification cited Cuba’s supposed support for Russia in the NATO-Ukraine conflict—a baseless and easily debunked allegation.
This “extremely aggressive and intimidating” campaign, condemned by Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez, influenced the vote. Traditionally, no more than four countries opposed the resolution—the U.S. and Israel always included—while this time, seven countries voted against: Argentina, Hungary, Macedonia, and Ukraine for the first time, Paraguay for the second time since 1993. Abstentions also rose sharply (12), mainly among nations like Poland, the Czech Republic, Romania, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, which had typically supported ending the blockade.
Reuters’ revelations were corroborated when abstaining countries justified their votes by accusing Cuba of backing Russia in the Ukraine war. The Romanian delegate stated that “foreign involvement in a war of illegal aggression is a blatant violation of the UN Charter.” These Eastern European regimes, enslaved politically and economically to the U.S. and EU since the 1990s, depend on their protectors and are thus vulnerable to blackmail.
The imperialist coercion compelling small and dependent states to back resolutions enabling interference in Cuba, while suppressing support for the island amid the blockade, underscores that true equality among nations inside the same multilateral framework is unattainable as long as an economic and military superpower can dominate lesser countries. This superpower, along with its allies—the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, and others—utilizes vast wealth acquired through global exploitation to buy off officials in other nations and, failing that, threatens their careers and internal politics, ensuring these actors uphold imperialist control through the UN.
Thus, I must concur with the secretary-general of the Communist Party of Lugansk, a victim of NATO’s war via Ukraine, who once told me bluntly: the UN is American trash.
About the Author
