Donald Trump has suggested the US could carry out a “friendly takeover” of Cuba as tensions between Washington and Havana reach a new high after the capture of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro.
As he left the White House for a campaigning event in Texas on Friday, Trump said: “The Cuban government is talking with us. They’re in a big deal of trouble.”
Although he gave no further details, it has been widely reported that US officials had met with Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, the grandson of 94-year-old Raúl Castro, on the sidelines of the Caribbean leaders summit, Caricom, as part of negotiations on opening up the island.
Trump said on Friday: “They have no money, they have no anything right now. But they’re talking with us and maybe we’ll have a friendly takeover of Cuba.”
The president’s comments come as relations between the two countries have sunk to one of their lowest points in an often bitter 67-year history. The US has cranked up pressure on Cuba’s struggling regime after its successful abduction of Venezuelan president and Cuba ally Nicolás Maduro in January.
International Glance
Four years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the war is still being fought far away from the frontlines – behind locked doors, in windowless cells, and in silence.
The confirmed count of Russian soldiers, officers, sailors and airmen confirmed killed in action or dead of combat injuries in Ukraine has passed 200,000, the research group Mediazona announced on Tuesday, citing new survey findings.
Casualty counts: Over the past 24 hours, seven Palestinians were injured in Israeli attacks in Gaza. The total recorded death toll since October 7, 2023 stands at 72,073 killed, with 171,756 injured. Since October 11, the first full day of the so-called ceasefire, Israel has killed at least 615 Palestinians in Gaza and wounded 1,658, while 726 bodies have been recovered from under the rubble, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
New York City offers a contractor for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the U.S. Border Patrol, and the Israeli Defense Forces millions of dollars in rent and construction subsidies, according to leases obtained by Drop Site through a Freedom of Information Law request.
Overnight, Ukraine’s Defense Forces struck Russian command posts, ammunition depots, logistics hubs and a repair base in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories, including with US-supplied ATACMS missiles, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said on Tuesday, Feb. 24.
The United States has announced it will soon provide in-person passport services at an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank.





























