{"id":611530,"date":"2026-09-01T20:22:11","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T20:22:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/611530\/"},"modified":"2026-09-01T20:22:11","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T20:22:11","slug":"cuban-cafe-in-belfast-hit-by-us-sanctions-on-havana-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/611530\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuban cafe in Belfast hit by US sanctions on Havana \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Cuban owner <\/a>of a Belfast sandwich shop has suspended Deliveroo orders following the company\u2019s failure to pay him due to US economic sanctions on what he describes as \u201canyone associated with Cuba\u201d.<\/p>\n

Carlos Arguelles, founder of the city centre based Cuban Sandwich Factory, said he was \u201cangry and very sad\u201d that he has been forced to cancel the online delivery service due to the stoppage in regular payments by a US bank over the past two months.<\/p>\n

Half of his staff depend on the Deliveroo orders and Arguelles said he cannot afford to keep paying their wages.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0\u2018The country is being strangled\u2019: Cubans suffer as Trump turns the screwOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Based in Belfast since 2012, the business owner said a similar situation arose during the first Trump administration, when he was asked to prove he was a UK resident by a Deliveroo rep.<\/p>\n

The business owner has been living in Northern Ireland since 1998 after moving from Cuba to marry a Co Antrim woman.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last payment we received from Deliveroo was in mid-June and it has been sporadic since then. This is not Deliveroo\u2019s fault but the American bank that makes the payments. There seems to be an automatic trigger as soon as the word \u2018Cuba\u2019 appears,\u201d said Arguelles.<\/p>\n

\u201cMr Trump is trying to make it very difficult for anyone or anything associated with Cuba, even a wee sandwich shop in Belfast. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the first time I\u2019ve had to suspend these orders. It\u2019s crazy this is happening. But no guarantee of any payment date or indeed ever being paid what has now run to over \u00a37,000; it is unsustainable for us to continue with Deliveroo.\u201d<\/p>\n

Deliveroo has been contacted for comment.<\/p>\n

For months, Cuba has faced ever-tightening economic sanctions by the US.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Cuba runs out of diesel and fuel oilOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Since announcing the move in an online post on Tuesday, Arguelles said he has been inundated with messages of support.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a horrible environment, as there is now an impact on my orders. I\u2019ve had to cancel some orders from my suppliers. The meats, the bread, the baker \u2013 every single thing will be affected. It\u2019s not a good situation,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cI took the decision to suspend the orders against my Deliveroo rep\u2019s advice, but I felt I had no choice. Around 20 to 30 per cent of my orders come from them. I was talking to a lot of restaurant owners and they have not been affected \u2013 so it is now down to me being Cuban. I have family affected in Cuba by the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cuban owner of a Belfast sandwich shop has suspended Deliveroo orders following the company\u2019s failure to pay…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":611531,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-611530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=611530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/611531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=611530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=611530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=611530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}