On Monday, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced it was bringing charges against a U.S. diplomat accused of spying for Cuba for more than 40 years.
While announcing the charges Attorney General Merrick Garland said Victor Rocha's mission was “one of the highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the United States government by a foreign agent.”
Victor Manuel Rocha, 73, was charged for working as a covert agent with Cuba's General Directorate of Intelligence since at least 1981, the same 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.
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.
“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.”
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.
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