Meliá Hotels International will terminate all its activities in Cuba on Friday 24 July, withdrawing from the 34 hotels and roughly 14,000 rooms it still operated on the island. The decision, communicated to Spain’s stock market regulator on Tuesday, closes a 36-year chapter that began in 1990 when the group became the first foreign hotel operator to establish a joint venture with Havana after the Soviet collapse.

The group’s Portuguese subsidiary, through which it managed the Cuban portfolio, stated that persistent operational, legal, economic and financial difficulties had made “even minimal operational stability impossible, de facto and de jure”. The immediate trigger is a cascade of US measures: a presidential decree signed in May that threatens foreign companies doing business with sanctioned Cuban entities, and a petroleum blockade enforced since January that has allowed only a single Russian tanker to reach the island. Fuel shortages have crippled hotel operations and the wider tourist infrastructure.

Meliá had already suspended contracts in June for 15 hotels linked to GAESA, the military-run conglomerate targeted by Washington. The full exit now extends to all remaining properties, including those managed with the tourism ministry, and covers brand use, incoming tour operations and local supply chains. The company is evaluating the financial impact, including a possible write-down of the book value of its Cuban assets, and will detail the charges when it publishes first-half results. First-quarter data already showed the strain: occupancy across its Cuban hotels fell to 34.1 percent, down 6.5 points year on year, while revenue per available room dropped 8.6 percent to €34.40, far below the group average of €84.

Meliá says it is working to ensure an orderly transition to limit the impact on staff, suppliers and clients. The hotels are expected to continue operating under local management without the Spanish brands. The exit adds to a pattern of foreign disengagement from Cuba under the revived sanctions regime, following departures by a mining company and a bank. The next concrete marker will be the release of Meliá’s half-year accounts, which will quantify the financial cost of the withdrawal.