Cuban Leader Calls for ‘Urgent’ Economic Change

On Monday, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel called for an “urgent” transformation of his country’s Communist economic model. The move appeared to be a concession to increased diplomatic and economic pressure from the United States.

• Cuban state media said Díaz-Canel spoke to the Council of Ministers, the highest body of the government, on the need to give municipalities and the Cuban private sector more autonomy. He urged more foreign investment in the energy sector and called for a “resizing of the state apparatus.”

On January 3, President Donald Trump suspended Venezuelan oil shipments to Cuba, and on January 29, he signed an executive order placing tariffs on any other country that sends oil to Cuba.

• Cuba requires roughly 100,000 barrels of oil daily for essential services and likely has less than three weeks of oil reserves left.

On February 4, the Trump administration said it would authorize companies seeking licenses to resell Venezuelan oil to Cuba’s private sector, forcing the Communist dictatorship to relinquish at least some control over businesses for the island nation’s economy to survive.

The Trump administration seeks to create a rift in the Cuban government between the old guard, who support doctrinaire Marxist-Leninism, and a new, more business-minded generation. This strategy appears to be working as the Cuban government just authorized private companies to partner with state-run enterprises as a first step toward coaxing the U.S. into selling it some oil.

• Some analysts, including Rep. Carlos Giménez, the only Cuban-born member of the U.S. Congress, says Cuba is approaching its Berlin Wall moment.

Prophecy says: The late Herbert W. Armstrong long forecast that the Berlin Wall would collapse and Germany would reunite. He based this on Bible prophecies about a revived Holy Roman Empire comprised of five nations in Western Europe and five nations in Eastern Europe. Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry made a similar Bible prophecy-based forecast about Cuba.

• In a 2015 article written shortly after the Vatican brokered a deal between Cuba and the Obama administration to restore diplomatic ties between America and Cuba, Mr. Flurry highlighted Bible prophecies about an economic siege of the U.S. by a revived Holy Roman Empire, noting that the Catholic Church would be a greater enemy than the Communist Party of Cuba.
• “Modern Cuba is a Communist nation, but it has only been Communist for about 50 years—less than a lifetime,” he wrote. “It has been a Catholic country for almost 500 years! Today, between 60 and 65 percent of Cubans say they are Catholic, so it’s clear that the church’s influence remains deeply entrenched. Fidel Castro is close to death. And Raúl Castro is quite old. So, the political equation could change radically in the next few years—or even months.”

Fidel Castro died a year later, and his brother Raúl stepped down five years after that. The main reason the Communist Party is still in power is Venezuelan oil, and now President Trump is cutting that off. This makes regime change likely if the U.S. keeps up the pressure. The Bible reveals what to expect next.