Cuba owes China more than 4 billion dollars, according to report

The Government of the Island owes China 4,643 million dollars for initiatives of the Asian nation for the development of low- and middle-income countries, according to a report published this Wednesday on the platform Cubatrade , of the United States-Cuba Economic and Commercial Council

The document was prepared by AidData , a research and innovation laboratory located at the College of William & Mary ( Williamsburg, Virginia), which provides access to the development finance activity records of most official aid donors, including China.

As explained The Asian giant has provided record amounts of international development financing and established itself as a first-resort financier for many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), although its grantmaking and lending activities remain secret. to.

Using a unique granular and comprehensive dataset of China’s international development finance, the report looks at operations such as the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a global infrastructure development strategy adopted by the government of that territory in 2013 to invest in about 70 countries and international organizations.

The data suggests that at least 42 low- and middle-income countries now have debt exposure levels to China that exceed 10% of GDP. Cuba is the main beneficiaries of Chinese ODA .

“Several countries, such as Cuba and Sudan, have encountered similar obstacles [“Las sanciones de Estados Unidos y los” problemas monetarios “hicieron que fuera demasiado difícil proceder”] to the implementation of the BRI project,” he says.

Based on the information analyzed, Cuba owes China US $ 4.643 billion in “exposure to sovereign and hidden debt” for the BRI and ODA. The BRI is considered a centerpiece of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and of the foreign policy of Secretary General and President Xi Jinping.

In 2019, Forbes magazine reported that Beijing had forgiven the Government of Cuba a debt of six billion dollars in 2011 . The aforementioned media detailed that, in the previous 18 years, China canceled about 9,800 million of the debt that other countries had.

Beijing, one of the main allies of the regime from Havana, has maintained donations to the Island in the context of the coronavirus. At the end of August, donated 22 tons of medical supplies and 150 oxygen concentrators before the overflow of the Cuban health system due to the pandemic.

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