Right to live without blockade in Cuba

The Right to Live Without a Blockade… reveals the impact on the Cuban population of nearly six decades of sanctions imposed by successive US administrations. It focuses primarily on the human dimension of the conflict, gathering testimonies about the meaning of the blockade in the daily lives of those living in Cuba, mainly women, but also includes historical data and information on the policies implemented. With a global health crisis, a change in US policy toward Cuba is more urgent than ever, and Oxfam is calling for the normalization of relations between the two countries.

Oxfam, an international development organization working to end the injustices caused by poverty, believes that current US policy toward Cuba poses a serious obstacle to development that would benefit the Cuban people. The web of laws and executive measures—often referred to as an embargo in the United States, but experienced as a blockade in Cuba—that prevents the free exchange of relations between the island's eleven million inhabitants and the United States and other nations, hinders the full exercise of their rights.

This report was commissioned by Oxfam and written by Ernesto Fidel Domínguez Mederos, with the collaboration of Conner Gorry, based on a study by the Center for World Economy Research (CIEM) conducted by: Dr. Jonathan Quirós Santos (coordinator), Dr. Blanca Munster Infante, Mr. Kenny Díaz Arcaño, and collaborators Dr. Ramón Pichs Madruga and Dr. José Luis Rodríguez García, also from CIEM, and M.Sc. Fermín Quiñones Sánchez, from the Cuban Association of the United Nations (ACNU). The testimonies of Marta Deus, Berta Lidia Castro, María Guadalupe Guzmán, Niurys Ysabel Higueras, Georgina Alonso, Alina Beltrán, Hilda Zuleta, Dayanis Alonso, Mareelén Díaz, and Lirians Gordillo come from this research.

DOWNLOAD REPORT