WASHINGTON (AP) — Recent United States sanctions targeting Cuba’s leadership and the indictment of former President Raúl Castro are a “pretext” for the Trump administration to persuade the American people to support a military intervention, Cuba’s top diplomat to the United States told The Associated Press.

In an interview on Tuesday, Ambassador Lianys Torres Rivera repeated accusations against the Trump administration made by other Cuban officials, including the foreign minister and the president, and complained bitterly that the US is targeting Cuban civilians with its decades-old embargo and new blockade of energy shipments to the island.

“The sanctions against our leaders, we see as a pretext to make the American people think we are a threat,” she said at Cuba’s embassy in Washington. “We are not a threat to the US, and we don’t want confrontation.”