Manuel Rocha, a former US ambassador to Bolivia for Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, told a judge he will plead guilty on Thursday to working as an unregistered agent for the Cuban government for four decades, the Washington Post reports. A State Department employee since 1981, Rocha was charged in December with working for the Cuban government.
The Justice Department asserts Rocha was a Cuban agent when he was hired by the State Department during the Reagan Administration and slowly rose though the ranks until he was named ambassador to Colombia, his native country. Prosecutors says over that 40 year period, Rocha provided intelligence to his Cuban handlers, including visiting Havana on at least one occasion, in 2017.
Rocha was arrested after repeatedly meeting with an undercover FBI agent in 2022 and 2023, who told Rocha he was Rocha’s new contact for Cuba. In numerous conversations with the agent, Rocha referred to former Cuban leader Fidel Castro as “Comandante” and called Cuban intelligence agents “Compañeros,” or comrades.