Cuban students stage sit-in at Havana University amid energy crisis

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Students staged an impromptu sit-in protest at the steps of Havana University on Monday, pressing officials about how Cuba’s energy crisis has disrupted classes and education. The group said the situation has reduced in-person instruction and has pushed more classes online, while outages and transport problems also complicate students’ ability to get to university.

The protest drew a small group of students, according to the Associated Press account. Students said the university has reduced the number of courses or switched some classes online because power outages and transportation shutdowns have strained daily life on and around campus.

Several students also pointed to the digital bottleneck they face when classes move online. They said many students are struggling with slow and unreliable internet, a condition that can interfere with participation and access to course materials.

One of the protesters, who did not want to be identified by name due to fear of government reprisals, said they were not acting on behalf of any side and that there had been “no other way” to raise their concerns. The protest took place as many people across Havana were walking to work or shopping because of the day-to-day limitations affecting transportation.

Cuba’s fuel rationing has also tightened access to movement, the report said, with gasoline rationed to 20 liters per car and fill-ups requiring appointments that can take weeks. Those constraints have fed broader disruptions that university students said spill into schooling and attendance.

Later, Modesto Ricardo Gómez, Cuba’s First Deputy Minister of Higher Education, stepped out to speak to the students. The minister acknowledged financial difficulties affecting higher education and said those problems have been made worse by the current standoff with the Trump administration.

Gómez framed the dispute in strong terms, saying the students were “tremendously affected” by what he called a “criminal and genocidal blockade” by the United States government, arguing it is “truly massacring an entire society.” The report said he linked the energy and education strain to the broader U.S.-Cuba confrontation.

The protest also came amid heightened U.S.-Cuba rhetoric following a U.S. meeting last weekend in Florida with conservative leaders from Latin America and the Caribbean. At the summit, President Donald Trump said the U.S. would turn its attention to Cuba after the war with Iran and suggested his administration would cut a deal with Havana, adding, “Great change will soon be coming to Cuba.”

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel described the summit as “small, reactionary and neocolonial.” Trump also said high-level talks are underway between Cuba and the U.S. government, while the Cuban government, the report said, had not confirmed that meetings are happening.

The Associated Press account traced part of Cuba’s current energy trouble to U.S. actions related to Venezuela’s oil shipments to the island. It said Trump ordered a U.S. military operation that captured Venezuela’s then-president, Nicolás Maduro, and that after the capture Trump signed an executive order that would impose a tariff on goods from countries that provide or sell oil to Cuba—further crippling Cuba amid a deepening energy crisis.

Since then, the report said, no oil shipment has arrived in Cuba, which it said produces only one-third of its own energy needs. The sit-in at Havana University underscored how the shortage is reaching into education, even as both U.S. and Cuban leaders trade public statements about Cuba’s future.