Will Grant

You can see it play out in real time.

I mean, the rolling blackouts in Havana alone, and then add on top of that, in the wake of the removal of Nicolas Maduro from power, the forced removal...

Their outlook looks even bleaker for Cubans because they are contemplating the very real possibility of the tap of Venezuelan crude being switched off.

And that Venezuelan crude has, to all intents and purposes, propped up the Cuban revolution for the past two and a half decades.

Well, I don't think we're there yet on that.

But let me give you a little picture.

There was a sort of anti-US imperialism march that went past the US embassy in Havana, led by the president.

And as that was happening, we were getting information on our phone that the now interim president, Del Cid Rodriguez, was meeting with the head of the CIA in Caracas.

And of course, I showed this information to a Cuban official and he sort of went grey because it does give the indication, the fear, I think, within the Cuban government is that it does signal a much greater willingness to work with the Trump administration and therefore sort of jettison the close relationship with Havana.

Correct.

And I mean, I think most estimates suggest that Venezuela has remained the main supplier of oil to Cuba.

But there's no doubt that Mexico is an important partner.

Now, would they step in and replace Venezuela entirely or...

Well, I think then we need to look at Claudia Sheinbaum's list of priorities.

I think that there will be significant pressure put on her government by the Trump administration to not replace Venezuela, to not replace Nicolas Maduro's relationship with Cuba.

Absolutely.

And I can't imagine that any kind of negotiation will be acceptable to the White House or to Marco Rubio that didn't involve, as you say,

basically root and branch reform.

And quite clearly, that isn't acceptable to the Cuban government.

So it currently looks like yet another moment of political conflict, if not spilling over into actual conflict for the time being.