A US government aircraft landed in Havana on Friday 10 April 2026 carrying assistant-secretary-level State Department officials, the first US government landing on the island since 2016. Cuba's foreign ministry under-director Alejandro Garcia del Toro confirmed the talks publicly on Tuesday 21 April, describing them as "respectful and professional" with "no threats or deadlines". Axios broke the visit; Al Jazeera and the Spokesman-Review corroborated.
The published US conditions ran across the structure of the Cuban state. Washington asked for the release of named political prisoners, an end to repression, economic liberalisation, Starlink terminal access, compensation for assets confiscated in 1959, and a reduction in Russian and Chinese influence on the island. Starlink is the satellite-internet service that bypasses Cuba's state telecom monopoly; the request for terminal access targets Havana's information control directly. Garcia del Toro called the secondary-tariff threat "blackmail" and said Cuba's first demand was the lifting of the energy blockade.
EO 14380, the Trump executive order activated in late January , nominally walls Cuba off from US engagement; the Havana landing demonstrates that a direct State Department track has been running in parallel for at least eight days before GL 134B extended Russian-oil cover. Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla's 14 April statement framing US sanctions as "extraterritorial" coercion made no reference to direct contact, consistent with Garcia del Toro's confirmation following the visit by eleven days rather than preceding it.
UNE deficit reports put Cuba's grid shortfall at 1,732 MW on 15 April; Garcia del Toro's energy-blockade demand frames the bilateral channel as a fuel-supply negotiation as much as a human-rights one. The Florida delegation revocation letter has produced no Treasury response in 75 days, leaving the State Department track as the operational US Cuba policy of the fortnight.
