Havana (AFP) – Drastic restrictions on cross-country travel took effect Thursday in cash-strapped Cuba, with spaces on ever scarcer trains and buses now reserved for the sick, people traveling for funerals and other emergencies.
Issued on: 18/06/2026 - 05:32
3 min Reading time
Cuba has been running on empty since the United States in January cut off its fuel imports as part of a pressure campaign aimed at forcing changes to the communist island's economic model, if not its leaders in Havana.Transport across the island, which was already reeling from the worst economic crisis in memory, has screeched to a near halt as petrol pumps run dry.From Thursday, trains from the capital Havana to cities in the east will only run every 16 days - compared to around three times a week previously.Public buses, which used to run at least once daily to provincial cities, will only operate one to three times a week.Deputy Transport Minister Luis Ladron de Guevara emphasized that no permits were needed to travel but that a "priority system" would operate.Passengers are required to apply seven days in advance for passage.Cuba has vowed to resist the US pressure while announcing reforms to attract investment and compensate for the flight of foreign capital.Lives on the lineThe restrictions on inter-city transport affect state-run transportation, on which most Cubans depend.While small numbers of private taxis and buses continue to serve other cities, they are prohibitively expensive -- up to 200 times the price of the state alternative.Outside a state-run bus office in Havana, 51-year-old Madelaine Montero was waiting on Wednesday for a ticket to take her father, an 80-year-old cancer patient, home to Granma, some 750 kilometers (466 miles) away in the east.She told AFP he needed to be home 20 days before his next check-up to undergo tests, "otherwise he can't receive treatment."
