Cuba Issues - 2023

Disputes - international

US Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay is leased to US and only mutual agreement or US abandonment of the facility can terminate the lease

Trafficking in persons

tier rating:

Tier 3 — Cuba does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so; the government made some efforts to investigate, prosecute, and convict sex traffickers, and identify victims; however, there was a government policy or pattern to profit from labor export programs with strong indications of forced labor, particularly in its foreign medical missions program; the government continued to deploy Cuban workers to foreign countries using deceptive and coercive tactics, and failed to address an increasing number of allegations from credible NGOs and foreign governments of labor violations and trafficking, and of Cuban officials’ involvement in abuses; Cuban law did not explicitly prohibit labor trafficking as defined in international law (2022)

trafficking profile: human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Cuba and Cubans abroad; individuals are forced or coerced into participating and threatened to stay in labor export programs, most notably foreign medical missions; sex trafficking and sex tourism, including child victims, occur within Cuba; traffickers exploit Cubans in sex trafficking and forced labor in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, Latin America, and the United States; foreigners from Africa and Asia are subject to sex trafficking and forced labor in Cuba to pay off travel debts; officials identified children, young women, elderly, and disabled persons as the most vulnerable to trafficking; the government uses high school students in some rural areas to harvest crops without pay, claiming that the work is voluntary (2022)

Illicit drugs

Cuba is not a major consumer, producer, or transshipment point for illicit drugs; domestic production and consumption curbed by aggressive policing; prescription drug abuse remains low

 

NOTE: The information regarding Cuba on this page is re-published from the 2023 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Cuba 2023 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Cuba 2023 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.