US is in talks with Cuban leadership, says Trump, after blockade threats

Washington is negotiating with Havana’s leadership to strike a deal, Donald Trump has said, days after threatening Cuba’s reeling economy with a virtual oil blockade.“Cuba is a failing nation. It has been for a long time but now it doesn’t have Venezuela to prop it up. So we’re talking to the people from Cuba, the highest people in Cuba, to see what happens,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida on Sunday.“I think we’re going to make a deal with Cuba.”Trump gave no indication what such a deal might entail.The US president had said on Saturday: “It doesn’t have to be a humanitarian crisis. I think they probably would come to us and want to make a deal … They have a situation that’s very bad for Cuba. They have no money. They have no oil. They lived off Venezuelan money and oil, and none of that’s coming now.”Trump’s second administration has been ratcheting up pressure on the communist-run island nation off south Florida since it ousted the Venezuelan leader, Nicolás Maduro, whose country was a close ally of Havana and a crucial source for oil exports to Cuba.On Thursday, the Republican president signed an executive order threatening to impose additional tariffs on countries that sell oil to Cuba.Hours later, Cubans were queueing up on Friday in long lines at petrol stations in Havana.Trump and the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, the Miami-born son of Cuban exiles, have made no secret of their desire to bring regime change in Havana.After Maduro’s fall, the US president warned Havana to “make a deal soon” or face unspecified consequences.“NO MORE OIL OR MONEY FOR Cuba: ZERO!” Trump had stated earlier, claiming Cuba was “ready to fall”.The Cuban government has accused Trump of seeking to strangle the island’s economy, where daily power cuts are intensifying and lines at petrol stations are getting longer.