Cuba Wins UN Vote, But Support Falls to 30-Year Low
The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted a resolution on Wednesday calling for an end to the United States embargo against Cuba, but support for the island fell to its lowest level in three decades. The Cuba UN vote passed with 130 votes in favour, 17 against and 25 abstentions, the lowest level of support since 1995.
Nearly every year since 1992, similar resolutions have been put to a vote and passed. This year’s resolution called for lifting the economic, trade and financial embargo against Cuba, and it included a reference to the impact of restrictions on fuel supplies to the island imposed by the United States since January.
The Cuba UN vote: a smaller majority
The shift from last year was sharp. Reuters reported that the 2025 resolution passed by 165 votes to 7, with 12 abstentions. This year, several countries that backed Cuba in the past moved to abstain or oppose the text, after a lobbying push from Washington.
Several Western countries, including Germany and Italy, abstained for the first time in many years, Reuters reported. The United States and Israel were among the 17 countries that voted against the resolution. The 193-member General Assembly has adopted the resolution annually for more than three decades, except in 2020 during the COVID pandemic.
The vote carries political weight, but only the United States Congress can lift the Cold War-era embargo. The United States has voted against the UN resolutions since 1992, but it abstained for the first time in 2016 under former president Barack Obama, as Washington and Havana moved towards a closer relationship.
Sharp words from both sides
In recent weeks, Havana accused Washington of mounting a diplomatic offensive to pressure countries into withdrawing their support for the Cuban resolution. Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel celebrated the result in a post on X on Wednesday, while accusing the United States of pressure and blackmail.
“The world has once again spoken out overwhelmingly against the blockade, even despite the most blatant pressure and blackmail from the US to change the course of this vote,” Mr Diaz-Canel said, later adding that the US engages in “gangster-like coercion”.
Speaking in New York, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez accused Washington of seeking to “determine the nation’s destiny” and “seize” its wealth. In the minutes before the vote, US ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz denied that Cuba was under a blockade and said “the plight of the Cuban people is exclusively the fault of this corrupt communist regime”.
After the vote, Mr Waltz told reporters he was satisfied that so many countries, including major economies such as South Korea and Germany, had shifted their position. “Diplomacy takes time, but now that we’ve had a tripling of countries that have shifted, we expect that to only to continue to grow,” he said.
Why the vote matters beyond New York
Cuba has blamed US sanctions for the crisis the country is mired in, which it describes as its worst economic downturn in decades, marked by shortages of basic goods, collapsing infrastructure and runaway inflation. Last month, Cuba’s electrical grid suffered a total collapse, plunging the island into darkness and leaving millions without power.
The United States has maintained a trade embargo on Cuba for more than 60 years, and President Donald Trump’s administration has been stepping up the pressure, after using the military in January to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Last month, Mr Trump said at the UN that Cuba was a failed state and that freedom would be coming to the island nation.
For readers in Pakistan, the vote is a measure of how far Washington’s current approach can move even long-standing UN majorities. A resolution that once passed with 165 votes now passes with 130, and the countries that changed sides include some of America’s closest partners in Europe. That trend, rather than the headline result, is the real story of this year’s vote.
Frequently asked questions
How did the Cuba UN vote go?
The resolution calling for an end to the US embargo on Cuba passed with 130 votes in favour, 17 against and 25 abstentions.
