Following massive street protests over the communist country’s worst economic crisis in decades, Russia delivered over 100 tonnes of humanitarian supplies to Cuba, according to the defence ministry on Saturday.

According to the report, President Vladimir Putin personally ordered the delivery.

According to a statement, two An-124 cargo planes carrying more than 88 tonnes of humanitarian goods took off from a military airport near Moscow.

The cargo included “food, personal protective equipment and more than one million medical masks,” it said.

Also Read: US sanctions Cuba for repressing protests, Biden warns more to come

The US sanctioned Cuba’s defence minister and a special forces unit this week for putting down peaceful protesters.

President Joe Biden warned that this was “just the beginning” of retaliatory actions against Havana.

Thousands of Cubans marched in 40 locations on July 11 and 12, chanting “Freedom,” “Down with the dictatorship,” and “We’re Hungry.”

Since the demonstrations began, one person has died and over 100 people have been detained.

Russia cautioned against “outside interference” in Cuba, a key Cold War ally, earlier this month.

Almost two weeks after the biggest protests since the revolution that brought Fidel Castro to power in 1959, independent observers and activists have published lists with at least 600 names of people who have been detained for protesting.

UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet last week expressed concern at claims that individuals were being held incommunicado, and that the whereabouts of some were unknown.

She added that “all those detained for exercising their rights must be promptly released.”

Also Read: US looks to expand embassy in Cuba after protests

Havana, under US sanctions since 1962, has blamed the show of discontent on Washington pursuing a “policy of economic suffocation to provoke social unrest.”  

The rallies against the communist government are the largest since the Cuban revolution of the 1950s and come as the country endures its worst economic crisis in 30 years, with chronic shortages of electricity, food and medicine, just as it records a spike in coronavirus infections.  

“Born to conquer and not to be conquered!” shouted the crowds at the rally, which had gathered at dawn on the Malecon, Havana’s famed oceanfront boulevard.