{"id":394017,"date":"2026-01-07T23:19:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/394017\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T23:19:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:19:08","slug":"mexico-becomes-crucial-fuel-supplier-to-cuba-but-pledges-no-extra-shipments-after-maduro-toppled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/394017\/","title":{"rendered":"Mexico becomes crucial fuel supplier to Cuba but pledges no extra shipments after Maduro toppled"},"content":{"rendered":"

MEXICO CITY — As the United States prepares to seize control of Venezuelan oil<\/a> and the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump<\/a> hardens its stance toward Cuba<\/a>, Mexico has emerged as a key fuel supplier to Havana.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a role that could further complicate already strained relations with the Trump administration, even though the Mexican government insists that exports to the island have not increased.<\/p>\n

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum acknowledged on Wednesday that \u201cwith the current situation in Venezuela, Mexico<\/a> has become an important supplier\u201d of crude oil to Cuba, but asserted that \u201cno more oil is being sent than has been sent historically; there is no specific shipment.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added that those shipments are made via \u201ccontracts\u201d or as \u201chumanitarian aid,\u201d but offered no concrete figures on the number of barrels exported.<\/p>\n

Following the 1959 revolution that toppled dictator Fulgencio Batista, the U.S. imposed a trade embargo on Cuba<\/a> in response to the nationalization of American-owned property. Under the embargo \u2014 long denounced by many countries, including Mexico \u2014 Cubans have suffered economic and energy crises<\/a>, driving hundreds of thousands of Cubans to migrate, especially to the United States.<\/p>\n

Blackouts that last up to eight hours and long lines at gas stations are routine across Cuba.<\/p>\n

Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ednez, a 65-year-old former construction worker and resident of Old Havana whose power goes out daily, said the upheaval in Venezuela will impact Cuba.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe blackouts are going to intensify with all this,\u201d he said, adding that he believes the U.S. attacked because they want Venezuela’s oil. \u201cThey own the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, street vendor Yeison G\u00e1lvez, 37, worries about the impact on transportation: \u201cFor as long as I can remember, we\u2019ve depended on Venezuela for fuel. We\u2019re going to be walking even more.”<\/p>\n

It’s unclear if any country would increase oil shipments to Cuba after the U.S. attack on Venezuela.<\/p>\n

The Mexican government has avoided commenting on its future plans. Exports to Cuba represent a very small percentage of total exports \u2014 3.3% \u2014 but their economic profitability is questionable, and Pemex\u2019s production continues to decline.<\/p>\n

From January to Sept. 30, 2025, Mexico shipped 19,200 barrels per day to Cuba: 17,200 barrels of crude oil and 2,000 barrels of refined products, according to the most recent report that state-owned oil company Petr\u00f3leos Mexicanos submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.<\/p>\n

Pemex did not immediately respond to a request for data.<\/p>\n

Jorge Pi\u00f1\u00f3n, of the Energy Institute at the University of Texas at Austin, who tracks shipments using oil tracking services and satellite technology, shared similar data this week with The Associated Press for the same period. He had tracked 22,000 barrels per day and said that the figure dropped to 7,000 barrels after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio\u2019s visit to Mexico City<\/a> in September 2025.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, in the last three months, Maduro\u2019s government exported an average of 35,000 barrels a day to Cuba, approximately a quarter of the island\u2019s total demand, according to Pi\u00f1\u00f3n<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The academic saw no likelihood that Mexico would increase its shipments: \u201cThe U.S. government would go bonkers,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere will be more pressure from the United States regarding Cuba,\u201d said Oscar Ocampo of the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness, adding that oil will predictably be one of the areas under pressure, a view shared by many experts.<\/p>\n

Mexico has historically sent oil to Cuba, especially during periods of power blackouts<\/a> and social unrest.<\/p>\n

After widespread protests in Cuba in 2021, Mexico sent one of its largest humanitarian aid shipments, which included 100,000 barrels of fuel. And in October 2024, it sent more than 400,000 barrels in just a few days following serious blackouts in Cuba, according to data provided at the time by Pi\u00f1\u00f3n.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way this has been done also incentivizes opacity,\u201d Ocampo said, because since 2023, the shipments have been made via private Pemex subsidiary, Gasolinas Bienestar, whose financial situation \u201cis not transparent.\u201d<\/p>\n

In its report to the SEC, Pemex states that the shipments to Cuba were valued at approximately $400 million and were \u201csales\u201d made through contracts at market price. But Ocampo says it cannot clearly be determined whether that was the case or if they were discounted shipments, with some kind of quid pro quo \u2014 perhaps the deployment of doctors \u2014 or as humanitarian aid.<\/p>\n

The foreseeable lack of profitability in supplying oil to Cuba comes as 2025 is set to become the year in which Pemex exported the least amount of crude oil, \u201cwith less than 600,000 barrels per day, when just a couple of years ago we exported more than 1 million,\u201d Ocampo said.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Associated Press reporters Andrea Rodr\u00edguez in Havana and D\u00e1nica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico contributed.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Follow AP\u2019s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/latin-america<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MEXICO CITY — As the United States prepares to seize control of Venezuelan oil and the administration of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394018,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[190782,23,966,28,3321,793,3,111,20446,21,19,22,20,25,24,965],"class_list":["post-394017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-190782","tag-america","tag-article","tag-business","tag-energy-industry","tag-general-news","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-transportation-and-shipping","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394017\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394018"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}