US Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered a direct video address to the Cuban people on Wednesday, offering a "new path" toward a transformed relationship with the United States while Washington moved to criminally indict 94-year-old former Cuban leader Raúl Castro. The address, delivered in Spanish by Rubio — himself the son of Cuban immigrants — marked an escalation in American pressure on the communist-governed island nation, located roughly 145 kilometres south of Florida.

In his speech, Rubio accused Cuba's ruling elite and the military-backed conglomerate Gaesa — estimated to control around 40% of the Cuban economy — of theft, corruption, and the systematic oppression of ordinary citizens. "The only thing standing in the way of a better future are those who control your country," Rubio said, framing the US offer as one contingent on genuine political transformation. "President Trump is offering a new path between the US and a new Cuba — a new Cuba where you have a real opportunity to choose who governs your country."

Alongside the political overture, Rubio reiterated an offer of $100 million in food and medicine, with the condition that the aid be distributed through the Catholic Church rather than the Cuban government, in order to bypass official channels. The US Justice Department was simultaneously expected to announce criminal charges against Raúl Castro in connection with the 1996 downing of two civilian aircraft flown by anti-Castro pilots — an incident that has long been a source of grievance for Cuban exile communities in the United States.

The pressure campaign has intensified in recent months following the US-backed removal of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, a close regional ally of Havana, and the subsequent imposition of a fuel blockade on Venezuela that has severely curtailed oil supplies to Cuba — one of the island's last remaining economic lifelines. Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel rejected the aid offer, calling instead for the United States to lift its longstanding economic embargo. "The humanitarian situation is coldly calculated and induced," he wrote on social media, arguing that easing or lifting the blockade would address the crisis more effectively.

Despite the sharp rhetoric, diplomatic contact has not entirely ceased. A high-level meeting took place in Havana on 10 April — the first time a US government aircraft had landed in the Cuban capital since 2016 — suggesting that back-channel engagement continues even as Washington increases its public pressure. Raúl Castro served as Cuba's president from 2008 to 2018, succeeding his brother Fidel, and oversaw a brief historic rapprochement with the United States in 2015 under President Barack Obama — a détente that Trump subsequently reversed during his first term.