Foreign relations of Cuba

Cuba's foreign policy has been highly dynamic depending on world events throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. Cuban foreign policy is impacted by the various spheres of influence and economic development of neighboring countries. During the 1980s, its geopolitical alignment with the Soviet Union isolated Cuba on the international stage. The fall of the Soviet Union, end of the Cold War, and emergence of Russia as a key trading partner led to limited regional relations. Cuba began to establish bilateral relations with South American countries during the late-1990s, mainly with Venezuela and Bolivia. Cuba has a cold relationship with the United States, with a variety of bilateral issues due to historic conflict and divergent political ideologies. It has a similarly strained relationship with the European Union (EU) due to Cuba's human rights policies. Since the late-2010s, Cuba has developed closer ties to Venezuela, Russia, and China.

Cuba provided civilian assistance workers – principally medical – to more than 20 countries as medical diplomacy. More than one million exiles have escaped to foreign countries. Cuba is slated to be a part of the United Nations Human Rights Council from 2024 to 2026. It is a founding member of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, a member of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the Latin American Integration Association and the United Nations. Cuba is a member of the Non-Aligned Movement and hosted its September 2006 summit. In addition as a member of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), Cuba was re-appointed as the chair of the special committee on transportation issues for the Caribbean region. Since November 2004, several leaders of South America have attempted to make Cuba either a full or associate member of the South American trade bloc known as Mercosur. Cuba's present foreign minister is Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla.

In 1917, Cuba entered World War I on the side of the allies.

Following the establishment of diplomatic ties to the Soviet Union, and after the Cuban Missile Crisis, Cuba became increasingly dependent on Soviet markets and military and economic aid. Castro was able to build a formidable military force with the help of Soviet equipment and military advisors. The KGB kept in close touch with Havana, and Castro tightened Communist Party control over all levels of government, the media, and the educational system, while developing a Soviet-style internal police force.

Castro's alliance with the Soviet Union caused something of a split between him and Guevara. In 1966, Guevara left for Bolivia in an ill-fated attempt to stir up revolution against the country's government.

On August 23, 1968, Castro made a public gesture to the USSR that caused the Soviet leadership to reaffirm their support for him. Two days after Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia to repress the Prague Spring, Castro took to the airwaves and publicly denounced the Czech rebellion. Castro warned the Cuban people about the Czechoslovak 'counterrevolutionaries', who "were moving Czechoslovakia towards capitalism and into the arms of imperialists". He called the leaders of the rebellion "the agents of West Germany and fascist reactionary rabble."

"Cuba has a unique symbolic allure. It is the small country that confronted the U.S. empire and has survived despite the attempts by all U.S. presidents since to subdue its communist government. It is the island with iconic leaders like Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, and the Latin American country that in the language of revolutionaries everywhere embodies the struggle of socialist humanism against the materialism of capitalist societies. Cuba is also the small nation that in the past sent its troops to die in faraway lands in Latin America and even Africa fighting for the poor."

— Moisés Naím, Newsweek