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The Future of Cuba

Moises Saman documents Cuba’s worsening humanitarian crisis since the Trump administration’s energy embargo in January 2026

Moises Saman

In Central Havana, a schoolboy walks past a street filled with piles of uncollected garbage, some of it still burning along the curb. With fuel shortages crippling municipal services, trash collect (...)

In late March, Moises Saman traveled to Cuba on assignment for TIME magazine to document the island’s worsening humanitarian situation since the Trump administration’s energy embargo in January. After deposing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the U.S. Department of State declared, “This is OUR hemisphere,” cutting off decades-long energy ties between Cuba and Venezuela and blocking energy supplies from other nations.

Alongside an article by TIME Senior Editor AJ Hess, Saman’s photographs document Cuban communities grappling with severe fuel shortages, price surges, and power outages as U.S. sanctions continue. Despite limited food, medicine and basic public services across the island of 11 million people, Cubans persist in a country already strained by multiple crises.

“Saman’s images reflect […] Cuban communities full of both pride and questions about the future of their country,” Hess writes, adding, “Who, indeed, does the hemisphere belong to?”

Read the full article in TIME magazine.

Hanel Hernández Torres (right) prepares a meal in her home in Matanzas as her son, Kyliam, sits on the staircase nearby. With cooking oil often unavailable or prohibitively expensive, many familie (...)

Hilda Rosario Rodríguez, 77, sits inside her one-room apartment in Matanzas, where she lives alone and depends on help from neighbors to get through daily life. The small living space has stained w (...)

A man stands on a balcony under a single bulb, in a neighborhood in Havana sitting largely in darkness during a nighttime blackout. Amid a deepening energy crisis fueled by severe shortages, aging (...)

Pepe Alfonso rests in a hallway of his home in Cuajaní after a day in the field. In parts of the Cuban countryside, limited access to fuel, transport, and modern infrastructure continues to shape (...)

Residents gather along a street in Matanzas, Cuba, during a Good Friday procession. In recent years, public religious observance has become more visible across Cuba, offering a space for collective (...)

Residents take part in a Viernes Santo (Good Friday) procession through the streets of Matanzas, carrying a large wooden cross as they move through neighborhoods marked by aging buildings and visib (...)

Cuban national athletes train inside a gym at the Estadio Panamericano, where aging equipment and worn out interiors reflect years of limited resources and maintenance. Built for the 1991 Pan Ame (...)

Schoolchildren and local residents gather beneath the shade of trees in Varadero, Cuba, as they prepare for an outdoor performance, raising a Cuban flag while a young musician tunes his guitar near (...)

Young performers from the Compañía Cirabana circus train inside a deteriorating former theater in central Havana. The group, made up of children and teenagers from at-risk families, rehearses acrob (...)

Television screens display archival footage of Fidel Castro delivering speeches at the Fidel Castro Ruz Center in Havana, where moments from his decades-long leadership are preserved and presented (...)

A barber cuts a client’s hair inside a small barbershop in Viñales, Cuba. American tourism was once a key source of income for the community, a town long shaped by visitors drawn to its surrounding (...)

A caregiver assists an elderly resident during a meal inside the Santovenia convent in Havana, where older adults receive daily care and support. As shortages of food, medicine, and basic services (...)

Children gather along a quiet street in Cárdenas, Cuba, playing and lingering in the shade of weathered buildings. In towns like Cárdenas, where economic hardship and emigration have reshaped dail (...)

More on Cuba:

Violet Isle: A Duet of Photographs from Cuba

Fidel Castro: The Cuban Revolution

Nikos Economopoulos on Cuba

René Burri: Cuba y Cuba