The former US ambassador is accused of spying for Cuba

His name is Manuel Rocha, and according to the accusations, he was secretly working for the Cuban government from 1981 to 2017.

Manuel Rocha, a retired diplomat who worked for the U.S. government for decades, was like that Accused That he was a spy for the Cuban government.

According to the charges, Rocha – 73 years old, born in Colombia but raised in the United States – was in contact with Cuban intelligence agents from the beginning of his diplomatic career, in 1981, until at least 1981. Rocha began his diplomatic career in 1981, with increasingly important roles in American delegations in various countries, especially South America but also in Italy. Between 2000 and 2002, he held his most important role, that of ambassador to Bolivia, a South American country.

The charges against him follow an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the US federal investigative agency, in which an undercover agent contacted Rocha pretending to be a Cuban agent. In this context, it appears that Rocha was willing to cooperate to subvert the United States, which he also called the “enemy.”

Relations between the United States and Cuba have historically been very hostile, and information provided by Rocha to Cuban intelligence may have been passed on to the governments of other countries competing with the United States, such as Russia. US Attorney General Merrick Garland, who serves as attorney general and oversees the indictments, said Rocha’s operation could be “one of the most high-profile and longest-lasting infiltration operations” of the US government.

Rocha is accused of illegally pursuing the interests of a foreign state. It is not clear how much information he passed on to the Cuban government: a counterintelligence expert also heard from it The New York Times He said it would be very difficult for the United States to find out without Rocha’s cooperation.

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