Officials in Havana are praising a recent vote at the United Nations calling for the United States to end its 48-year-old trade embargo against Cuba. One hundred eighty-three nations in the United Nations General Assembly voted in favor of lifting the embargo. Israel, the Marshall Islands and Palau joined the United States in opposing the resolution. The U.N. has passed a similar resolution for 15 consecutive years.

Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez: “Our people have won a strategic victory over a policy which has tried to defeat it through hunger and sickness and, without success, tried to bring it to its knees. On a day like yesterday at the U.N. filled us all with pride and gives us hope in the conviction of how much prestige and support our fight has on an international scale.”