US imposes sanctions on Cuban leader Raul Castro's son-in-law

The Trump administration is targeting the son-in-law of retired Cuban leader Raul Castro with penalties as it moves up its battle against the communist island’s government.

The offices of State and Treasury announced Wednesday that they had combined Luis Alberto Rodríguez López-Calleja to the U.S. list of “specially designated nationals and blocked persons.”

López-Calleja is the head chair of the Cuban military’s fiscal arm, which measures government businesses, including hotels, factories, stores, and an airline.

The departments of State and Treasury announced on Wednesday that Luis Alberto Rodríguez López-Calleja, the spouse of Castro’s daughter, Deborah, was accommodating to finance human rights injustices and working in concert with Venezuela to suppress Cubans’ freedoms using revenue created from the Cuban military’s financial arm: the Grupo de Administración Empresarial S.A. (GAESA).

López-Calleja is the head of GAESA, which manages state-owned businesses including hotels, factories, stores, and an airline. The movement stops any assets he may have in U.S. jurisdictions and restricts Americans from doing business with him.