The closure of US Agency for International Development (USAID) programmes does not mean an end to the hostile policy against Cuba, experts said today.

For the deputy director general for the United States at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Johana Tablada, the dismissal of some 5,800 employees, and the cut of more than 400 billion dollars from the Agency’s funds promoted by Donald Trump’s administration, is in reality a readjustment of these subversive programmes.

Proof of this is the recent announcement of unilateral sanctions that increase the aggression against the Caribbean nation’s international medical cooperation under fallacious arguments.

According to the official, none of the characteristics that define an operation of exploitation or human trafficking are present in these programmes, and they are in line with UN schemes for South-South cooperation.

On 25 February, the US State Department announced its decision to suspend visas associated with the Caribbean nation’s international medical cooperation agreements, a measure described by Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez as another unjustified aggression against the Cuban people.

Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, once again puts his personal agenda ahead of his country’s interests. The suspension of visas associated with Cuba’s international medical cooperation agreements represents the seventh measure of unjustified aggression against our people in a month, he noted on the social network X.

In the television programme, professor Jacinto Valdés-Dapena recalled that the USAID was created on 3 November 1961, after the failure of the invasion of mercenary troops at Playa Girón, due to the US government’s need to isolate the Cuban Revolution and silence its example.

For the panellists, this funding, aimed at promoting regime change, is maintained today, directly and indirectly, for example, to the so-called independent press, despite the fear of the recipients of these funds about their possible suspension.