U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland introduced Monday that Victor Manuel Rocha, the previous U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, has been charged with appearing illegally as a overseas agent for the federal government of Cuba.

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U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland introduced Monday that Victor Manuel Rocha, the previous U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, has been charged with appearing illegally as a overseas agent for the federal government of Cuba.

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A longtime U.S. diplomat who served as ambassador to Bolivia has been arrested and charged with being a Cuban spy.

Victor Manuel Rocha was a State Department worker for greater than 20 years. Prosecutors say throughout that point and within the 20 years since, he acted as an unlawful agent for Cuba. He was formally charged right this moment in federal court docket in Miami.

Rocha was born in Colombia and have become a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1978. According to the felony criticism, he started working for the State Department in 1981. Over the subsequent twenty years, he held positions at U.S. embassies in Mexico, Honduras, the Dominican Republic, Argentina and Bolivia the place he served as ambassador.

U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, Victor Manuel Rocha, talks to the press 11 July 2001.

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U.S. ambassador to Bolivia, Victor Manuel Rocha, talks to the press 11 July 2001.

Gonzalo Espinoza/AFP through Getty Images

From 1995 to 1997, he was stationed within the U.S. Interest Section in Havana, Cuba.

“This action exposes one of the highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent,” U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland stated in Washington following Rocha’s arrest.

Rocha is charged with conspiring to behave as an agent of a overseas authorities and with passport fraud.

“Like all federal officials, U.S. diplomats swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. Acting as an agent for Cuba – a hostile foreign power – is a blatant violation of that oath and betrays the trust of the American people,” FBI Director Christopher Wray stated.

In the criticism, prosecutors say the FBI was alerted of Rocha’s alleged work for Cuba in 2022. An FBI undercover worker, posing as a Cuban agent, then contacted Rocha and held a sequence of conferences with him in Miami. In these conferences, the criticism says Rocha admitted to being a Cuban agent for practically 4 many years.

His stint within the U.S. Interest Section in Havana between 1995 and 1997 was at a time of heightened tensions between the 2 nations. In February 1996, the Cuban army shot down two airplanes operated by Brothers to the Rescue, a U.S. group against the Castro regime. Four individuals had been killed. At one of many conferences with an undercover FBI worker, Rocha referred to as it “the knock down of the small planes.” He stated, “Brothers to the Rescue and other similar people …were pushing politics toward unnecessary provocations.”

In 2002, whereas serving as ambassador to Bolivia, Rocha inserted himself into that nation’s presidential race, warning Bolivians that in the event that they elected former coca grower Evo Morales President, the U.S. may retaliate by chopping assist. The transfer gave the leftist Morales a lift, and is credited with serving to him win election three years later.

The federal felony criticism would not cite any particular episodes the place Rocha’s work for Cuba undermined U.S. coverage or pursuits. In his conferences with the FBI informant, Rocha seems to have grown more and more assured and bragged concerning the significance of the knowledge he offered the Cuban authorities.

“For me, what has been done, has strengthened the Revolution,” he stated. “What he have done…it’s enormous…More than a grand slam.”