{"id":43653,"date":"2026-05-13T16:50:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T16:50:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/43653\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T16:50:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T16:50:11","slug":"u-s-bullies-canadas-sherritt-corporation-out-of-cuba-peoples-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/43653\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. bullies Canada\u2019s Sherritt corporation out of Cuba \u2013 People’s World"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"U.S.\t<\/p>\n

The flag of the Sherritt mining and energy company flies alongside Cuban and Canadian flags at one of the company’s facilities in Cuba. | Sherritt International<\/p>\n

TORONTO\u2014A sweeping new executive order<\/a> signed by President Donald Trump has forced one of Canada\u2019s most significant foreign investors out of Cuba, drawing sharp condemnation from solidarity groups who say Washington is using financial coercion to override the sovereign economic decisions of other nations.<\/p>\n

Toronto-based Sherritt International Corporation, the largest foreign investor in Cuba for over three decades<\/a>, announced on May 7 that it was suspending all direct participation in its joint venture activities on the island and immediately bringing back its Canadian employees currently stationed in Cuba\u2014a direct fallout from Executive Order 14404<\/a>, which Trump signed on May 1.<\/p>\n

After attacking Venezuela and kidnapping its president, Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, in January, Trump said \u201cCuba is next.\u201d Step by step, he seems to be making good on the threat.<\/p>\n

His May 1 order, framed<\/a> as a measure to hold the Cuban government \u201cresponsible for repression\u201d and supposed threats to U.S. national security, does far more than target Cuban officials. Legal experts say its secondary sanctions provisions\u2014which threaten foreign financial institutions with loss of access to U.S. correspondent banking accounts if they process transactions involving designated Cuban entities\u2014are effectively an attempt to extend Washington\u2019s domestic law across the globe.<\/p>\n

The law firm Mayer Brown described<\/a> the order as \u201cintended to internationalize pressure on the Cuban government by deterring foreign commercial engagement with certain targeted sectors or actors linked to the Cuban government.\u201d Under the order, any non-U.S. person operating in Cuba\u2019s energy, metals and mining, financial services, defense, or security sectors can face asset-blocking sanctions.<\/p>\n

On May 7, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the first designations under the new authority, targeting GAESA<\/a>\u2014the Cuban military conglomerate said to control at least 40% of the island\u2019s economy\u2014as well as Moa Nickel SA (MNSA), the joint venture in which Sherritt holds a 50% stake alongside Cuba\u2019s publicly-owned General Nickel Company.<\/p>\n

Three decades of partnership with Cuba<\/p>\n

Sherritt is widely considered to be Cuba\u2019s largest foreign investor, with a history in the country<\/a> spanning more than 35 years. The company began purchasing Cuban nickel concentrate for its Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, refinery in 1991, and in December 1994 formalized a 50\/50 joint venture<\/a> with Cuba\u2019s General Nickel Company to integrate mining at Moa, in Holgu\u00edn province, with refining in Alberta.<\/p>\n

\"\"Decades of partnership: Cuban President Raul Castro, center, listens to a translator as Ian Delaney, then-president of the Canadian company Sherritt International Corp., right, looks on during a visit to a gas processing plant in Boca de Jaruco, Cuba, June 6, 2007. | Adalberto Roque \/ AP<\/p>\n

It was also hit by the U.S.\u2019 blockade on Cuba in that era, long before Trump. The company was the first to be targeted by the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, the law which sought to strangle Cuba while its economy was in freefall in the post-Soviet period. Sherritt executives were banned from entering the United States because the industrial sites on which it operated in Cuba had been expropriated from private ownership by the socialist government decades earlier.<\/p>\n

Canadian law, however, does not forbid trade with Cuba, and the company was undeterred by U.S. actions. In 1998, Sherritt further expanded<\/a> into Cuba\u2019s energy sector, establishing Energas S.A., which operates 506 megawatts of independent power capacity\u2014making it the island\u2019s largest independent power producer.<\/p>\n

During the commodity boom of the late 2000s, Sherritt\u2019s market value<\/a> approached $5 billion CAD. In 2025, the Moa joint venture produced 25,240 tons of nickel and 2,728 tons of cobalt, while Energas generated 799 GWh of electricity.<\/p>\n

Sherritt had already been battered<\/a> before the latest executive order arrived, though. It is reported that Cuba owes the company at least $344 million USD, and nickel production has declined from 34,876 tons in 2021 to 25,240 in 2025. In February 2026, Sherritt suspended<\/a> nickel and cobalt production at Moa due to fuel shortages stemming from the U.S.\u2019 energy blockade of the island.<\/p>\n

Still, the May 7 executive order designations appear to be a fatal blow for not only the company\u2019s business with Cuba but perhaps its very existence. Three board members\u2014Chairman Brian Imrie, Richard Moat, and Brett Richards\u2014resigned with immediate effect the same day Sherritt announced the suspension of Cuban operations.<\/p>\n

\"\"Sherritt operates multiple facilities in Cuba\u2019s mining and energy sectors. Ore from Cuban mines also feeds its Alberta refinery. | Sherritt International<\/p>\n

The company has since filed an application with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice to allow its reduced board to continue functioning. Its Fort Saskatchewan refinery continues to operate on existing feed material inventory, but that supply is expected to run out by mid-June 2026, by which point Sherritt must make permanent decisions about its future.<\/p>\n

Direct assault on Canada\u2019s sovereignty<\/p>\n

The Canadian Network on Cuba (CNC), a solidarity organization, issued a forceful statement<\/a> calling Trump\u2019s executive order \u201cyet another illegal attempt to extend U.S. domestic law beyond its borders and impose Washington\u2019s unilateral sanctions regime on the entire world.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis represents not merely an attack on Cuba, but a direct assault on Canada\u2019s sovereignty, on international trade law, and on the principle that no state has the right to dictate the economic relations of other nations,\u201d the CNC\u2019s Executive Committee wrote.<\/p>\n

The statement calls on Prime Minister Mark Carney\u2019s government to invoke and enforce Canada\u2019s Foreign Extraterritorial Measures Act (FEMA), legislation originally amended in the 1990s in direct response to the U.S. Helms-Burton Act, which was itself designed to penalize foreign companies doing business with Cuba. The CNC warns that failure to act now would render FEMA \u201clittle more than a hollow gesture.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf Canada accepts Washington\u2019s ability to punish Canadian enterprises for engaging in lawful commerce with a third country, then Canada ceases to exercise meaningful economic sovereignty,\u201d the network wrote. \u201cToday it is Cuba. Tomorrow it could be any country or sector that falls afoul of U.S. geopolitical objectives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fred Wilson, writing<\/a> for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, said on the eve of Trump\u2019s order: \u201cFor most of the 67 years since the Cuban revolution, successive Canadian governments played the \u2018Cuba card\u2019 to assert independence from U.S. hegemony\u2014that is, they have refused to align themselves with the United States\u2019 hostile approach to Cuba, and used that lack of alignment to differentiate themselves from the U.S. on the world stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

The situation has changed, however. \u201cToday,\u201d Wilson argued, \u201cCanada\u2019s failure to play the Cuba card stands out as a confounding failure of Canadian policy and resolve.\u201d Carney has been mostly silent on the latest U.S. aggressions against Cuba, ignoring pressure from below.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Canadian Labour Congress<\/a>\u2014the largest federation of Canadian unions\u2014has condemned Trump\u2019s attacks on Cuba and urged Ottawa to break ranks. It called on the Carney government to \u201cstand with Cuba and defend the Cuban people\u2019s rights to sovereignty and self-determination.\u201d The CLC demanded that the Government of Canada \u201cvigorously denounce U.S. aggression and defend the principles of international law,\u201d while rushing aid to the people of Cuba.<\/p>\n

Going beyond humanitarian concerns, the CNC also highlights a particular irony in targeting Sherritt: The company operates nickel and cobalt refining capacity in Alberta that is crucial to the North American battery supply chain and energy transition. \u201cWhile Washington speaks endlessly about securing critical mineral independence,\u201d the statement reads, \u201cits policies are actively undermining one of North America\u2019s key refining operations because of its relationship with Cuba.\u201d<\/p>\n

Broader fallout<\/p>\n

The Trump administration has enacted over 240 new sanctions<\/a> against Cuba since January 2026, which have been piled on top of the already 64-year-old blockade. These latest measures have slashed the island\u2019s energy imports by 80 to 90%. Cuba\u2019s economy is projected to contract by 7.2% in 2026, according to the Economist Intelligence Unit. The United Nations Human Rights Office has warned that the blockade and ensuing fuel shortage have threatened Cuba\u2019s food supply and disrupted water systems and hospitals.<\/p>\n

The extraterritorial reach of E.O. 14404 has alarmed governments and businesses far beyond Canada. Legal analysts at Bird & Bird note<\/a> that European financial institutions processing transactions traceable to designated Cuban entities risk losing their access to U.S. dollar correspondent accounts, effectively cutting them off from global dollar-clearing systems.<\/p>\n

The Morrison Foerster law firm warns<\/a> that all non-U.S. companies across sectors from energy to financial services will have to review their \u201cCuba-related exposure\u201d or risk being targeted by the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

Sherritt\u2019s departure strips Cuba of its largest foreign mining partner and could reduce the island\u2019s independent power generation capacity by an estimated 10 to 15%. Paolo Spadoni, a Cuba scholar at Augusta University, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, \u201cWith \u2060Sherritt suspending operations, the U.S. has now effectively targeted all of Cuba\u2019s main sources of hard currency.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CNC\u2019s statement demands that Ottawa publicly denounce the executive order, invoke FEMA, provide legal and financial protections to affected Canadian firms, and coordinate with Mexico, the European Union, and CARICOM nations in resisting Trump\u2019s extraterritorial reach.<\/p>\n

\u201cSilence and inaction are not neutrality,\u201d the network concluded. \u201cThey amount to acquiescence.\u201d<\/p>\n

We hope you appreciated this article. At\u00a0People\u2019s World, we believe news and information should be free and accessible to all, but we need your help. Our journalism is free of corporate influence and paywalls because we are totally reader-supported. Only you, our readers and supporters, make this possible. If you enjoy reading\u00a0People\u2019s World\u00a0and the stories we bring you, please\u00a0support our work by donating or becoming a monthly sustainer today<\/a>. Thank you!<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCONTRIBUTOR<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"C.J.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The flag of the Sherritt mining and energy company flies alongside Cuban and Canadian flags at one of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[19193,17,2104,19194,17883,19195,435,19196,1645],"class_list":{"0":"post-43653","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-blockade","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-cuba","11":"tag-embargo","12":"tag-foreign-direct-investment","13":"tag-imperialism","14":"tag-mining","15":"tag-sanctions","16":"tag-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}