By Simon Lewis and Daphne Psaledakis
WASHINGTON, May 7 (Reuters) - The United States on Thursday imposed financial sanctions on a sprawling business conglomerate run by Cuba's military and a Cuban-Canadian mining joint venture, as the Trump administration ramps up pressure on the island's communist leaders by targeting sources of foreign investment.
After the military raid to seize the leader of longtime Cuban ally Venezuela in January, U.S. President Donald Trump has said
that "Cuba is next," and blocked
most oil shipments to the country, worsening power outages on the island.
Trump last week signed an executive order broadening U.S. sanctions against Cuba, a move President Miguel Diaz-Canel decried as "coercive."
Under that order, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Trump administration was targeting Grupo de Administracion Empresarial S.A. (GAESA), the military conglomerate that U.S. officials say controls at least 40% of Cuba's economy, and its Executive President Ania Guillermina Lastres Morera.
The measures also targeted Moa Nickel SA, a joint venture between Toronto-based Sherritt International Corp and Cuba's state-owned nickel company, which mines nickel and cobalt, Rubio said in a statement, accusing Cuba's government of providing a platform for intelligence operations of nations hostile to the U.S.
Sherritt said in a statement on its website on Thursday that it had suspended its direct participation in joint venture activities in Cuba, effective immediately.
The U.S. has long demanded Cuba open its state-run economy, pay reparations for properties expropriated by the government of former leader Fidel Castro and hold "free and fair" elections.
Cuba has said its form of socialist government is not up for negotiation. Top Cuban officials accuse Washington of "hinting at a military action" to "liberate" Cuba, and say decades of U.S. sanctions against the island's government are the root cause of its economic and social woes.
Rubio earlier this week held talks with military officials at the U.S. Southern Command in Florida, which oversees U.S. operations in the Caribbean region. He was photographed shaking hands with its commander, General Frank Donovan, standing before a map of Cuba.
"Today’s sanctions demonstrate that the Trump Administration will not stand by while Cuba’s communist regime threatens our national security in our hemisphere," Rubio said on X. "We will continue to take action until the regime takes all necessary political and economic reforms."
The sanctions came shortly after Rubio held talks at the Vatican with Pope Leo, who has raised concerns about rising tensions between the U.S. and Cuba and called for dialogue.
(Reporting by Simon Lewis, Daphne Psaledakis and Ismail Shakil; additional reporting by Patricia Zengerle; editing by Michelle Nichols, Paul Simao and Cynthia Osterman)
