The Spanish hotel group Meliá is to cease all operations in Cuba by the end of the week, citing "major difficulties" in doing business on the island amid intensifying pressure from Washington. In a statement to the Spanish stock market regulator, the company said new US sanctions had made it "impossible, de facto and de jure, to maintain even minimal operational stability", and it would try to ensure a smooth transition to limit the impact on staff, suppliers and clients. The move marks a significant retreat for one of Cuba's largest foreign investors and reflects the growing effectiveness of US measures in isolating the island's tourism sector.

Meliá, which has around 14,000 rooms across 34 hotels in Cuba, had already announced last month that it would stop running 15 of those properties, and has now extended this to cover its remaining sites, including 19 operated jointly with Cuba's tourism ministry. The withdrawal follows sanctions ordered by US President Donald Trump in May targeting individuals linked to Cuba and threatening foreign firms and banks that deal with them, part of a wider campaign against the island's military-run conglomerate GAESA. Meliá was the first Spanish hotel chain to enter Cuba in the 1990s, and its exit comes on top of a longstanding US economic embargo since 1962 and a near-total block on oil shipments to Cuba since January.