The head of the CIA flew to Havana on a rare top-level mission to demand “fundamental changes” from Cuba’s regime, as Donald Trump escalates pressure on the communist government to liberalise its economy.
The meeting on Thursday came after the government in Havana said it had run out of diesel and fuel oil supplies vital for power generation as the US has blocked nearly all oil from the island over the past four months.
CIA director John Ratcliffe met officials including Raul Rodríguez Castro, the grandson of the former president, who has been Havana’s interlocutor in recent talks with the US, as well as interior minister Lázaro Álvarez Casas and the nation’s spy chief.
At the same time, federal prosecutors in Miami were working toward securing an indictment of the former president Raul Castro, who remains a force in the country’s politics, according to several people familiar with the matter.
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The scope of the indictment and the number of defendants is being debated, but it could include drug trafficking charges and accusations connected to Cuba’s shooting down in 1996 of planes run by the humanitarian aid group Brothers to the Rescue, two of the people said.
A CIA official said Ratcliffe met the officials “to personally deliver president Trump’s message that the United States is prepared to seriously engage on economic and security issues, but only if Cuba makes fundamental changes”.
US officials have stressed that, while they are prepared to negotiate, they will not wait endlessly and do not rule out the use of military force.
Ratcliffe also discussed intelligence co-operation, economic stability and security issues but the US insisted “Cuba can no longer be a safe haven for adversaries in the western hemisphere”, the CIA official said. Trump has designated Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.
Cuba said it had provided evidence to “demonstrate categorically that it does not represent a national security threat to the US”.
The meeting comes as Washington has increased pressure on Cuba in recent weeks amid little sign of progress in talks that have been ongoing since February.
Last week the US placed new sanctions on Gaesa, the military-run conglomerate that plays a central role in the Cuban economy. Trump, through an executive order, has also moved to allow sanctions on foreign companies that do business with Cuba.
US secretary of state Marco Rubio, who has had a leading role in negotiations, said on Tuesday that Cuba had “a broken, non-functional economy, and it’s impossible to change it”.
He added: “It’s my personal opinion that you cannot change the economic trajectory of Cuba as long as the people who are in charge of it now are in charge of it.”
However, as the US pushes for economic and political reform, it has stopped short of calling for a transition to democracy as part of any agreement.
Cuba has said it is open to discussing democracy, human rights, business and co-operation with the US on migration and drug trafficking but insists its political, legal, social and economic systems are not on the table.
Cuba appeared on Thursday to open the door to receive $100 million (€86 million) in US humanitarian aid, after initial suggestions from Washington that Havana had refused it.
“If the US government really is willing to provide help in the amount that it has announced ... they will not find obstacles or ingratitude on Cuba’s part,” Cuba’s president Miguel Díaz-Canel wrote on X.
“The priorities are clear: fuel, food and medicine,” he added.
Ratcliffe’s flight, which took off from Washington’s Joint Base Andrews, is only the second official US flight to land in Cuba since 2016. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026. Additional reporting: New York Times
