Unionpay in Cuba: China Steps on the Toes of the US Embargo

This article is dedicated to those who underestimate the repercussions of the US embargo on the lives of common Cubans.

By Isidro Estrada

HAVANA TIMES — In May 2013, the Chinese bank conglomerate Unionpay, today made up of 20 different banks in China, began to offer its services in Cuba, making the Caribbean country one of the more than 142 nations around the world where the institutions’ cards are accepted and used. Cuba is the 14^th (and most recent) country in the Americas to establish these financial services.

Cuba’s inclusion is, in good measure, the result of requests made by the more than three thousand Chinese citizens who study or work on the island today and who require a reliable and permanent mechanism for receiving family remittances.

Having automatic tellers and exchange locales that accept Unionpay cards also has a collateral benefit for the small Cuban community in the Asian country which, owing to recent provisions stemming from the United States’ Cuba embargo/blockade, has been unable to conduct transactions at different Chinese banks over the past few months.

With cards bearing the Unionpay logo, it is now possible to exchange sums in Yuan (or Renminbi) accounts at Chinese banks into Cuban Convertible Pesos (CUC).

I have some personal experiences (and the experiences of other Cubans living in China) to share about this.

My Graduation as a Terrorist

It was a spring afternoon in Peking and my landline was ringing with the same insistence with which the season was trying to oust the winter.

“It’s for you, from the Everbright Bank. They want you to go to the bank as soon as possible so they can give you back the remittance you sent to Cuba. It was intercepted half-way. They’re not authorized to send it,” my wife told me with her habitual, Chinese serenity and her neutral Spanish accent.

My fears became a reality: I had been marginalized thanks to a Cold War relic. Three months before, a local Western Union employee had alerted me to this situation when, with all of the kindness in the world, he had surprised my ears with the phrase:

“We’re very sorry, sir. But, since you have a Cuban passport, we’re not authorized to offer you our services. We have instructions from the US Treasury Department, which forbids us, as the branch of a US company, from processing your remittance.”

The new incident, however, was beyond my comprehension. I had resorted to a fully Chinese bank and had sent cash in Euros, not US dollars, to my son in Cuba. But no, there’s no way around it. I can’t help but conclude that, when the US Treasury has it out for someone, there’s nothing anyone can do – not even a Chinese healer.

Faced with this situation, my one option at this point is finding a Good Samaritan who will do me the favor of taking the money in person when they travel to Cuba – and all because the Obama administration has got the idea into its head that Cuba is a terrorist country and that, as a citizen holding a passport issued by that country, I am a potential terrorist.

That’s what all Cubans living in China have to deal with at the moment, and until further notice. It’s all the same whether that Cuban is a member of the Communist Party or a dissident – we’ve all been thrown into the same sack.

This is why the day in which I slid my Chinese Unionpay card for my Yuan account at a teller in Havana and saw the multi-colored CUCs issue from the slot was a day of joyous celebration and sweet revenge for me.

“I screwed you, US Treasury!” I thought.
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Testimonies of Other Cubans Living in China, 2012

Osvaldo Perez: “Don’t waste time applying for a credit card in China. Cubans are on a secret black list for foreigners who are denied work visas – unless it’s via a government convention. They’re also denied credit cards in China.”

I know what I’m talking about, I speak from experience. I have a house, a brand new car, a work visa (don’t ask how I got it), a 22,000 RMB salary a month, and I was denied a credit card because of my nationality. What do you think? 

Graciela Fonseca: “I tried to open a Visa or MasterCard account and, everywhere I went, I was told I couldn’t, not even if I had the amount of money needed to do so. In some other places, like the Merchants’ Bank, I got such lousy service I wanted to cry. They checked a list in which Cubans appear as terrorists and didn’t allow me to apply for the card. I spent an entire day going from one bank to the next in Beijing, and, in every single one of them, I was told I couldn’t get a card after they saw my passport.”

Yani: “It’s true that Cuba is one of the countries that appears on the black list at the China Merchants Bank. That’s why they almost always deny us the possibility of opening an account at that bank. There is one way to do so via the Communications Bank. In my case, my husband has a Visa card issued by this bank. We asked for a second card, issued to my name. It’s the same account with two cards. I can use the card anywhere, it’s very convenient. Thanks to that, I can send money to my parents easily. The application isn’t complicated and it doesn’t take long. I know not all Cubans are married to Chinese citizens. I hope that those who aren’t find a solution soon.”

Nayib Hassan: “I know about the situation at the Merchants’ Bank very well. Unfortunately, Cuba has been on the list of countries that sponsor terrorism since 2005 thanks to Georg W. Bush (and Obama, who renewed the list in 2012). It is an unjust law that affects common Cubans alone.

Because of this, Cuba’s inclusion in the list, there’s nothing we can do. Obama ratified it: we’re in the same list as North Korea, Iran, Syria and Sudan – it’s shameful and truly unjust.

“Owing to this, Cubans can’t send remittances through any financial institution, because all of the world’s banks respond to the interests of the United States. Recently, in one of the most interventionist moves we’ve seen in the world, the Dutch company AIG was fined hundreds of millions of dollars for offering government and personal courier services to Cuba. It was a warning message. The only banks that sent remittances to Cuba were the ICBC and HSBC, but I think they’re no longer doing that.”