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\n Street vendors chat on the Malec\u00f3n during a blackout in Havana, Monday, March 16, 2026.
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Ramon Espinosa\/AP<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n Ramon Espinosa\/AP<\/p>\n <\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n HAVANA \u2014 Cuba is preparing to receive its first shipment of Russian oil this year, just days after the government announced it was operating on natural gas, solar power and thermoelectric plants as severe power outages continue to hit an island whose power grid is crumbling.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Russian-flagged Anatoly Kolodkin is some 3,000 nautical miles from Cuba in the Atlantic Ocean and is expected to reach the island in 10 days, Jorge Pi\u00f1\u00f3n, an expert at the University of Texas Energy Institute, told The Associated Press.<\/p>\n If so, that would mark the first time any oil shipment from any country reaches Cuba in the past three months given a U.S. energy blockade.<\/p>\n The tanker is carrying 730,000 barrels of fuel and is on the list of vessels of its type sanctioned by the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom following the war in Ukraine, Pi\u00f1\u00f3n said.<\/p>\n