In the face of the imminent arrival in Cuba of an oil tanker flying the Russian flag, the President of the United States, Donald Trump, said today that he prefers to let it through and that he has no objections to the island receiving the fuel.

«We have an oil tanker out there. It doesn’t bother us that someone receives a shipment of oil, because they have to survive,» Trump told journalists aboard Air Force One when asked about the issue, in what appears to be a shift from his rhetoric of recent days.

«If a country wants to send some oil to Cuba right now, I have no problem,» Trump stated. «I prefer to let it through, whether it’s Russia or another country,» added the Republican president, explaining his reasoning: «People need heating — about the tropical island — air conditioning and all the other things they need.»

On 29 January, Trump signed an executive order declaring a «national emergency» regarding Cuba, citing what Washington described as an «unusual and extraordinary threat» that the Caribbean country allegedly posed to the United States.

On that basis, the leader announced the imposition of tariffs on countries that supply oil to Cuba, accompanied by threats and coercion against any states that challenge the said executive order.

The Anatoly Kolodkin, which left Russia in early March with 730,000 barrels of oil, would be close to Cuban waters.

According to the specialised maritime tracking website MarineTraffic, on the afternoon of this Sunday the vessel was in the Caribbean Sea bound for Matanzas, where it could arrive on Tuesday 31 March.

Trump downplayed criticisms that allowing the tanker through would benefit the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin. «He loses a shipment of oil, that’s all,» he remarked, adding: «If he wants to do that, and if other countries also want to, it doesn’t bother me in the slightest.»

However, it was Trump himself who intensified the situation on the island with his executive order. The fuel shortage has made life even more difficult for the Cuban people, who have suffered for over six decades the effects of the longest economic, commercial and financial blockade ever imposed against any country.