HAVANA (AP) — Cuba on Friday welcomed home a diplomat expelled by the United States after an unusually heated confrontation between the two countries’ representatives at the United Nations this week.
Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Gerardo Peñalver posted a photo of Richard Tur de la Concepción, first secretary of Cuba’s U.N. mission, alongside Foreign Ministry officials holding a Cuban flag at Havana’s airport. It was Cuba’s first public response since the U.S. State Department announced it would take action against Tur after he tried to knock a phone out of a U.S. diplomat’s hand.
“We welcomed the young diplomat home,” Peñalver wrote on X, saying Tur had “firmly and with dignity confronted the disrespectful and provocative behavior” of the U.S. delegation.
Peñalver accused U.S. officials of trying to disrupt a vote on a resolution condemning the U.S. embargo on Cuba and undermine Tur’s candidacy for a position on a U.N. body.
Tur’s expulsion was announced by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz and later confirmed by the U.S. State Department.
U.S. officials accused Tur of shoving an American diplomat and trying to snatch the phone he was using to record their confrontation Tuesday during a General Assembly session on the embargo.
The encounter escalated into a shouting match between Waltz and Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez.
Cuba said Tur was defending himself after his personal space was invaded.
The confrontation came as tensions between the two countries have deepened since U.S. President Donald Trump imposed an energy blockade on Cuba in January in a bid to force changes to its government and political system. Washington has also threatened military action against the Caribbean nation.
Peñalver said the U.S. delegation’s behavior was part of a strategy to obstruct the vote against what he called the “genocidal blockade.”
Tur thanked Cuban officials for his reception in a post on X on Friday.
“Cuba will prevail over Yankee arrogance and anyone who seeks to intimidate us,” he wrote.
The General Assembly approved Cuba’s resolution Wednesday by a vote of 130-17, with 25 abstentions. The nonbinding measure calling for an end to the U.S. embargo is introduced annually.
