Former US ambassador charged with spying for Cuba

A former U.S. diplomat is accused of conducting a more than 40-year secretive campaign to spy on behalf of the Cuban government.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) said Monday it was charging Victor Manuel Rocha, 73, of working as a covert agent with Cuba’s General Directorate of Intelligence since at least 1981 — the year he was hired to work in the State Department.

Rocha, who served in multiple federal roles including as U.S. ambassador to Bolivia from 2000 to 2002, is accused of using access to classified information and foreign policy influence to benefit Cuba, including traveling outside of the U.S. to meet with Cuban representatives.

Attorney General Merrick Garland said Rocha’s mission was “one of the highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent.”

“Those who have the privilege of serving in the government of the United States are given an enormous amount of trust by the public we serve,” Garland said in a statement. “To betray that trust by falsely pledging loyalty to the United States while serving a foreign power is a crime that will be met with the full force of the Justice Department.”

Rocha faces counts of conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government, acting as an agent of a foreign government and using a passport obtained by false statement, according to the DOJ. He was arrested Friday in Miami and made an initial court appearance in Florida on Monday.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Rocha had obtained a lawyer.

The DOJ said Rocha allegedly revealed Cuban ties during a series of meetings with an undercover FBI agent in 2022 and 2023.

In the meetings, Rocha allegedly called the U.S. the “enemy,” praised Cuba and the late Cuban President Fidel Castro and referred to his decades of alleged covert work as “more than a grand slam” while acknowledging the work was “not easy,” according to the DOJ complaint.

Rocha also allegedly said at another meeting with the undercover agent that his work “strengthened the revolution” of his country, according to the complaint.

Cuba and the U.S. have had a strained relationship since the Cuban communist party seized power in 1959.

Rocha is from Colombia and became a lawful permanent resident after obtaining U.S. citizenship in 1978, according to the DOJ complaint.

During his time in the State Department, Rocha served in various countries in North America, South America and Central America, including Honduras, Mexico, Argentina and the Dominican Republic.

He also served with the National Security Council from 1994 to 1995 and as an advisor to the commander of the U.S. Southern Command, which has a jurisdiction covering Cuba, from 2006 to 2012, according to the DOJ.