Australians warned to ‘reconsider’ trips to Cuba as nation reaches brink of fuel crisis

Aussie travellers have been urged to avoid making their way to Cuba anytime soon, as the Central American island nation begins drifting further into chaos spurred on by the fuel crisis.

The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is advising people to “reconsider (their) need to travel” to one of the world’s last fully communist-identifying countries.

According to an alert published on DFAT’s Smartraveller website on Friday, key public services are being stretched thin by the worsening fuel crisis.

“Fuel shortages and frequent power outages are affecting transport and other services. Nationwide power blackouts are occurring. Some airlines have reduced or cancelled flights,” the alert reads.

“The situation could deteriorate quickly without warning and options to leave the country may reduce further. There’s also a shortage of essential supplies, including food, medicines and drinking water.”

The alert also warns of the potential for “demonstrations against the government”.

“Some can turn violent, causing injuries and deaths. They may occur anywhere across the country. Avoid protests and demonstrations,” it said.

Protests have already taken place this week following Cuban Energy Minister Vicente de la O Levy’s frank announcement the nation had “absolutely no fuel, oil, and absolutely no diesel” during a press conference on Wednesday.

“The only thing we have is gas from our own wells, whose production has increased, and domestic crude oil, whose production is also rising. The situation is very tense. The impact of the blockade is causing us significant harm, and we are still not receiving fuel,” he said.

In a lengthy X post published on Thursday, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez said the “particularly tense” situation had been caused by the US, which he said was “threatening irrational tariffs against any nation that supplies (Cuba) with fuel”.

“The crisis gripping us is the fruit of the harsh economic war imposed on us … it is a perverse design whose main objective is the suffering of the entire people, to hold them hostage and turn them against the government,” President Bermúdez said.

The US has engaged in some form of sanctions-based enforcement of trade relations against Cuba since the 1960s, most of which prevent free trade between American and Cuban businesses.

In 2025, a “total pressure” embargo under the Trump administration redesignated the island as a state sponsor of terrorism and reactivated a Cold War era law that prevented international foreign investment in the country.