Cuba sanctions an act of war

Our man in Havana's lowdown on latest crisis

- HENRY WIDDAS

THERE are times when we are all in despair - over money, relationships, work, or grief.

These are common woes we have all experienced, but how many of us despair over a genuine lack of food that leaves us at the point of starvation?

How many of us are left without a roof over our heads, or are having to risk living in crumbling buildings deemed unsafe for habitation, or are forced to live cheek-by-jowl with strangers in makeshift camps, some of whom are criminals and addicts?

In the UK, we may be the 99 per cent battling against the 1 per cent, but compared to the rest of the world we are the one per cent.

On a recent visit to Cuba, a country ravaged by decades of U.S. sanctions and embargoes, I came face to face with poverty that I never knew existed and it left me crushed.

My fears over the globalist-controlled censorship and propaganda that we all face, seemed irrelevant when I saw a group of men rummaging through a huge pile of roadside rubbish.

Seeing people fighting to avoid starvation puts the plight of life in the Western world into perspective.

Never before had I come across beggars with such desperate pleas and haunted eyes in the capital, Havana, they were not asking for money but for food.

The situation is exacerbated by a complete absence of medical supplies; a communist government crippled by a withdrawal of international trade; and a mass exodus of mainly young Cubans, who would rather risk drowning in makeshift boats over staying in their homeland.

Families have been fractured as young men and women flee Cuba in the knowledge they may never see their parents again.