Two young Spanish women who spent a month traveling in Cuba released a video on Tuesday acknowledging the repression and poverty plaguing the island.
Their statements came in response to backlash from an earlier video where they downplayed the Cuban crisis as "exaggerated doom-mongering."
The initial video, shared on April 21 through Marina Moreno's Instagram account, garnered over 25,000 views and sparked widespread criticism. In the video, the travelers, who had been in Havana since March 11, accused the media of misleading the public to deter tourism.
Facing backlash, they posted a second video on April 22, adopting a drastically different tone.
"Cuba is experiencing a critical period not only due to the U.S. embargo but also because of the Cuban government's own restrictions on its people," Marina Moreno stated in their retraction.
The two women identified themselves as "leftists who do not support the communist dictatorship that oppresses its society," clarifying that their initial aim was to highlight Cuba's reality to promote ethical tourism, not to whitewash the regime.
Unlike many tourists, the Spaniards stayed in a rental house in Centro Habana, one of the city's most affected areas, rather than a hotel.
"We've lived with daily power outages, water shortages, street trash, and empty store shelves," Moreno described in their follow-up video.
However, in the first video, they had downplayed these issues. "We're being manipulated with overly catastrophic news," they claimed, encouraging tourists to visit the island to boost the local economy.
The initial video also included figures illustrating the dire situation: a five-star hotel worker in Havana disclosed they had only 68 guests, just 5% of capacity. Tourism in Cuba dropped by 17.2% in 2025. The monthly salary of a Cuban doctor is about 7,000 to 8,000 Cuban pesos, equivalent to 12 to 14 euros.
This episode is part of a recurring trend of Western leftists minimizing the Cuban crisis.
In March 2026, Pablo Iglesias visited the island with the "Nuestra América" flotilla, claiming the situation was "difficult, but not as portrayed from outside," which sparked outrage among Cubans both domestically and abroad.
Many Cubans have responded strongly to such statements: "They have poverty, yes, but also freedom. Here we have misery and oppression," they said in October 2025 in response to Iglesias.
The two Spaniards announced plans to release more videos addressing power cuts, fuel shortages, medicine scarcities, and the so-called tourist siege law, aiming to "shed light from our perspective" and "extend a hand" to the Cuban people.
Understanding the Issues of Repression and Poverty in Cuba
What was the reaction to the initial video by the Spanish travelers?
The initial video sparked widespread criticism and backlash, as it downplayed the severity of the Cuban crisis and accused the media of exaggerating the situation to discourage tourism.
How did the Spanish travelers change their stance in the follow-up video?
In their follow-up video, the travelers acknowledged the critical situation in Cuba, attributing it to both the U.S. embargo and internal government restrictions, and clarified their stance as leftists against the communist regime.
What are some of the challenges faced by the Cuban population as described by the travelers?
The travelers described experiencing daily power outages, water shortages, trash accumulation in streets, and scarcity of goods in stores, highlighting the tough living conditions in Cuba.