HAVANA, April 22 (Reuters)—A cash crunch that began last year for Cuba appears to be getting worse as state-run banks insist they have little foreign currency for international money transfers or for significant withdrawals, western diplomats and businessmen said this week. They said they feared the communist-led island could be near insolvency, but hoped the government could keep the country's financial head above water and avoid the serious consequences of not being able to pay its bills. In over a dozen off-the record interviews, they said the liquidity crisis, which began after three major hurricanes bit Cuba late last year, had become more critical in recent weeks. At one bank this week, officials told an international business the offshore as much as possible. Sources said authorities have not been forthcoming on why the crisis developed nor how serious it is, but Cuban economists said the country was headed for trouble even before the three hurricanes caused $10 billion in damages, and the international financial crisis exploded. They described a perfect storm in which Cuba was hit by last year's spike in fuel and food prices, stuck with big contracts signed in 2006-2007 to supply infrastructure projects and unable to make its state-run economy's produce and react quickly to changing circumstances.