The already frosty relationship between Huenya and Milintica grew even colder today, as the Huenyan government announced sweeping sanctions against the government of Neina Arana.
“Effective immediately, the Huenyan Federation will place officials linked to the Milintican Communist Party and the regime of Neina Arana on its list of Sanctioned Nationals,” President Xiadani told the press. The list of sanctioned individuals includes Arana, her entire Cabinet, and thirteen other top MCP officials. The list also includes the heads of the National Police and the National Directorate of Intelligence and Prevention (NDIP), which have been instrumental in suppressing protests against the Arana government. The commanders of Milintica’s armed forces are also on the list. Also named to the list are two individuals, Iaka Hamuera and Maro Arepata, who lead Milintica’s Popular Freedom Militias and Red Wave Guards. The sanctions bar the named individuals from travel to or through Huenya and subjects them to possible arrest if violated. The sanctions also freeze any assets of the named individuals held in Huenya, and bar the named individuals from accessing the Huenyan financial system. Huenyan businesses are also barred from doing any transactions with the named individuals.
The President said that the sanctions are in response to the Milintican government suspending its legislature and banning all other political parties on January 7, 2025. The President added that more comprehensive sanctions “or other actions” were not off the table. “Along with our UCS partners and other allies around the world, the Huenyan Federation stands for democracy and freedom in Caxcana. When those values are threatened, Huenya will make our opposition to authoritarianism clear,” the President said. The President also stated publicly for the first time what Huenyan officials have privately been speculating for some time now – the possibility that Arana did not, in fact, win the Milintican presidential elections. “It is our belief, one supported by growing evidence, that Neina Arana’s ‘win’ was in fact an electoral coup,” the President said. This statement was underscored by the addition of Wera Hauraki, Chairman of the Peoples’ Electoral Committee, to the list of sanctioned Milintican officials as well.
President Xiadani made her sanctions announcement while touring Huenya’s Fort Achcauhyah military base in the city of Ixtenco. The visit to Fort Achcauhyah, which is a training site for the Huenyan army, was seen as an unspoken statement of its own to the Arana government. “The location of the sanctions announcement was not a mistake or an offhand choice. The President is sending a warning to Arana and her enablers in her own way,” a source close to the Presidency told DTNS.
If the sanctions, issued against the backdrop of a Huenyan military display, were meant to discourage the Arana government, the response from Huānoch was not promising. President Arana responded to the sanctions by calling President Xiadani “a right-wing, reactionary stooge of the corporate and capitalist interests who have always wanted to take Milintica down.” She added that Milintica would have responded with its own sanctions “if we bothered to trade with the Huenyan regime at all, but we don’t.” Arana also said that Milintica’s security forces “will protect and defend the revived revolution of the Milintican people.”
Despite Arana’s dismissal of the Huenyan sanctions, it is likely that the sanctions will have at least some effect. Milintica and Huenya enjoyed an extensive trade relationship prior to the Arana government taking power, one which grew even larger while both countries were in the Union of Caxcanan States. The two nations also have close historic and cultural ties. Milintica was founded in part by a diaspora of Huenyans fleeing the Xiomeran Empire’s takeover of Huenya in ancient times. When Huenya achieved its independence, the ties between the two countries were renewed. Milintica’s government even served as a sort of mentor to Huenya’s own new government in the first post-independence years. During this period, Milintican officials of all political persuasions eagerly participated in the emerging Huenyan economy. The Huenyan sanctions will place an abrupt halt to all of that, and will isolate Milintica even more as Arana pursues a “no trade with capitalists” economic policy. Huenyan officials confirmed that they will encourage other nations to place sanctions on Arana and her leadership, which could tighten the screws even more on Huānoch.
As the new government in Milintica trades barbs and veiled military threats with the government in Chuaztlapoc, the relationship between these once close allies with historic bonds has plummeted to an incredible new low in an astonishingly short period. It remains unclear how much further the relationship between the Huenyan and Milintican governments will deteriorate, but the situation has many observers in Caxcana looking grim.
