Cuban lawmakers faulted the intensification of the U.S. trade embargo against the Caribbean nation during a parliamentary hearing.

Addressing the audience, Cuba’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carlos Fernandez de Cossio, said the U.S. economic sanctions aimed to create social discontent among the Cuban people.

“The U.S. blockade is intended to avoid the success of a project committed to the Cuban people’s interests,” he said, adding that equity and social justice are guiding principles of the Cuban socialist revolution.

The remarks came ahead of the Cuban government’s presentation of its annual draft resolution against the embargo before the UN General Assembly scheduled for November.

Cuba’s First Deputy Minister of Public Health, Tania Cruz, said the U.S. government restricted the island’s access to medical supplies, medicines and reagents during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Neither can we access valves and pacemakers made in the United States, which are used for the treatment of patients with cardiovascular diseases,” she said.

According to Cuban official data, the U.S. sanctions in the past six decades have cost the Cuban economy $154.2 billion. First imposed in 1962, the embargo was tightened by former U.S. President Donald Trump, who put in place 243 more sanctions.

He banned all flights from the United States to Cuban destinations except for Havana and capped remittances Cuban Americans could send to their families back home.

The current U.S. administration allowed airlines to resume flights to other Cuban cities and lifted the cap on remittances, but the web of sanctions against Cuba remains largely in place. 

(Xinhua/NAN)