Javier Milei has sacked Diana Mondino, his foreign minister, after she voted at the United Nations to condemn the US embargo of Cuba.

The Argentine president, who has pushed for a realignment of his country’s foreign policy, is said to have been enraged after learning about the vote on Wednesday.

The non-binding motion at the UN General Assembly was passed with the backing of 187 nations. Only the US and Israel opposed it, while Moldova abstained.

Opposition to the embargo – and acceptance of the communist regime in Havana – have long been consensus positions in Latin America, even among conservative governments.

However, Mr Milei, an outspoken critic of Left-wing administrations both authoritarian and democratic, has recalibrated Argentina more closely with the US since coming to power last December.

“Argentina is going through a period of profound change [which] demands that our diplomatic corps reflects in each of its decisions the values of liberty, sovereignty and individual rights that characterise Western democracies,” Milei’s office said.

A spokesman added that the country was “categorically opposed to the Cuban dictatorship”.

Previous Argentine governments had taken a more sceptical stance while also being friendly with Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, and Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela’s president.

Earlier this year, Argentina’s state-owned oil company YPF stopped supplying Cuba’s national airline, prompting it to halt a decades-old service between Buenos Aires and Havana.