Cuba hands note of protest to U.S. over internet task force

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba handed a note of protest to the top U.S. diplomat in Havana on Wednesday over the Trump administration’s creation of a Cuba Internet Task Force that it said was an attempt to violate its sovereignty and carry out subversive activities.

A man sits on his Russian-made Ural motorbike as he checks the Internet at a hotspot in Havana, Cuba, December 15, 2017. Picture taken on December 15, 2017. REUTERS/Alexandre Meneghin

The U.S. State Department said last week it was convening the task force to promote “the free and unregulated flow of information” on the Communist-run island that has one of the lowest internet penetration rates in the world.

The group would examine ways of “expanding internet access and independent media”, it said.

“The Foreign Ministry’s note asked the U.S. government to cease its subversive, interventionist and illegal actions against Cuba... and calls upon it to respect Cuban sovereignty,” the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry had handed the note to Lawrence Gumbiner, the acting charge d‘affaires of the U.S. embassy in Havana.

The news came the day after U.S. Republican President Donald Trump underscored his administration’s sanctions on what he called the “communist and socialist dictatorships of Cuba and Venezuela” in his State of the Union address.

“Once again, the U.S. Government tries to justify the reinforcement of its unjust, illegal and universally rejected blockade policy versus Cuba with disrespectful language,” Cuba’s Foreign Ministry chief for U.S. Affairs Josefina Vidal wrote on her twitter accoun