CAPE TOWN, Oct. 26 (Xinhua) -- A major South African trade union on Friday added its voice to the chorus for lifting the decades-old U.S. embargo against Cuba.
The economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States against Cuba for almost six decades "is evil, deplorable, unjust, severe and extended system of unilateral sanctions ever applied against any country," the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said.
The union was speaking as the United Nations General Assembly is to vote again on an annual resolution to end the embargo on October 31, amid growing universal criticism against the U.S. for imposing the blockade.
"The blockade constitutes a massive, flagrant and systematic violation of the human rights of all the Cuban people and it qualifies as an act of genocide by virtue of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948," the NUM said.
The embargo also violates the UN Charter and international law and constitutes an obstacle for international cooperation, said the union.
The U.S. administration under President Donald Trump has intensified the blockade against Cuba since June, 2017, with the adoption of the Presidential Memorandum entitled "Strengthening the Policy of the United States towards Cuba."
In November last year, the U.S. Departments of the Treasury, State, and Commerce imposed additional obstacles on the limited opportunities for the U.S. business community and restricted the right of Americans to travel to Cuba.
The intensification of the blockade represents a serious setback to bilateral relations between the U.S. and Cuba, the NUM said.
The new sanctions against Cuba have caused a visible decrease in visits coming from the U.S. and have generated greater obstacles for the economic and trade relations of Cuban companies with potential American and third country partners, the union said.
These measures not only affect the Cuban state economy but they also affect the Cuban private sector, it added.
"The NUM calls on the U.S. to end the unilateral and unconditional manner, the unfair blockade which for almost 60 years has imposed suffering on the Cuban people," NUM national spokesperson Livhuwani Mammburu said.
