CARACAS, Feb 21 (Reuters) – Cuban security advisers and doctors have been leaving Venezuela as Interim President Delcy Rodriguez’s government faces intense pressure from Washington to unwind Latin America’s most consequential leftist alliance, according to 11 sources familiar with the matter.
Venezuela’s Interim President Delcy Rodriguez has entrusted her protection to Venezuelan bodyguards, according to four of the sources, unlike deposed president Nicolas Maduro and his predecessor, the late president Hugo Chavez, who both relied on elite Cuban forces.
Thirty-two Cubans were killed in the U.S. military attack that captured Maduro on January 3, according to the Cuban government. These soldiers and bodyguards were part of a deep security agreement between Caracas and Havana that began in the late 2000s in which Cuban intelligence agents embedded throughout the military and Venezuela’s formidable DGCIM counterintelligence unit, which was fundamental to weeding out domestic opposition.
“The Cuban influence was absolutely essential” to the survival of the Chavista government, said Alejandro Velasco, an associate professor of history at New York University and an expert on Venezuela.
Inside DGCIM, some Cuban advisers have been removed from their posts, according to a former Venezuela intelligence official. Some of the Cuban medical workers and security advisers have travelled from Venezuela to Cuba on flights in recent weeks, two of the sources said.
One source close to Venezuela’s ruling party said the Cubans were departing on the orders of Rodriguez due to U.S. pressure. The other sources were not clear on whether the Cubans were being forced to leave by the new Venezuelan leadership, departing of their own accord, or being summoned home by Havana.
The decision to sideline Cubans from the presidential guard and the counterintelligence unit has not been previously reported.
TRUMP WANTS END TO VENEZUELA-CUBA TIES
Prior to the operation to remove Maduro, thousands of Cuban doctors, nurses and sports coaches worked in Venezuela as part of welfare programs begun under Chavez. In exchange, Venezuela provided Cuba with a source of much-needed oil.
Following the U.S. attack, U.S. President Donald Trump vowed to end the security relationship between Venezuela and Cuba. “Cuba lived, for many years, on large amounts of OIL and MONEY from Venezuela. In return, Cuba provided ‘Security Services’ for the last two Venezuelan dictators, BUT NOT ANYMORE!,” he wrote on Truth Social on January 11.
In response to questions about U.S. pressure on Venezuela to cut ties with Cuba, a White House official said the U.S. has “a very good relationship with the leaders of Venezuela” and that it believes that Rodriguez’s “own self-interest aligns with advancing our key objectives.”
Severing Venezuela’s relationship with Cuba is part of Washington’s broader strategy of toppling Havana’s communist-run government. Since mid-December, Washington has blockaded Venezuela from shipping oil to Cuba, economically strangling the island.
The U.S. government is “talking to Cuba, whose leaders should make a deal,” the official said.
The Cuban government has said it is open to dialogue on equal terms, while condemning the oil blockade and vowing to resist U.S. intervention.
Neither the Cuban nor Venezuelan governments responded to requests for comment. The two countries have publicly affirmed their continued relationship.
Rodriguez, the daughter of a former Marxist guerrilla, has been a longtime ally of Maduro and member of Venezuela’s ruling Socialist Party. She’s also personally close to the Cuban government, according to ten U.S. and Venezuelan sources.
On January 8, Rodriguez appeared alongside Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez at a flower-laden memorial service in Caracas for the victims of the U.S. attack.
“To the brave Venezuelan people, we express Cuba’s deepest solidarity,” Bruno Rodriguez said at the event, before uttering the rallying cry of one of the leaders of the Cuban revolution, Ernesto “Che” Guevara: “Hasta la victoria siempre.”
Later in January, Delcy Rodriguez also spoke by phone with Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, saying afterwards that the two countries remained “united.” Diaz-Canel, after the same call, said Cuba was committed to “continue strengthening the historic relations of brotherhood and cooperation.”
Regarding the relationship between the two countries, the White House official said: “President Trump understands that they have to make certain statements for domestic political reasons.”
FLIGHTS BACK TO CUBA
A source familiar with the Cuban government’s thinking said that some military personnel injured in the U.S. attack have returned to Cuba, but that others have remained active in Venezuela. The source also said many Cuban doctors continue to provide care in Venezuela.
Cuba’s state-run media in early January said a suspension of commercial flights and closure of Venezuelan airspace had caused a backlog that prevented Cuba from bringing home doctors from vacations or for ending their missions in Venezuela. Those flights resumed the week after the January 3 U.S. attack, those reports said.
A U.S. source familiar with the matter said that while the Cuban presence is diminishing, some undercover intelligence agents are likely to remain in the country to see how the political situation pans out.
Frank Mora, who served as U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States under the Biden administration, said “Rodriguez is treading very carefully.”
“She wants to keep the Cubans at a distance until this situation calms down, until her hold on power is clear, but not entirely throw them under the bus, either,” Mora said.
At least some Cuban military advisers are still working in Venezuela, four sources familiar with the matter said. Cuban professors also continue to teach at the state university for police and security forces, known as UNES, according to a former police officer.
John Polga-Hecimovich, a professor at the U.S. Naval Academy in Maryland who has studied the role of Cuban security advisers in Venezuela, said the legacy of the Cuban counterintelligence effort is still evident in Caracas, where Maduro’s top loyalists remain in power.
“The Cubans didn’t manage to protect Maduro, but they played a key role in keeping the Chavista government in power,” Polga-Hecimovich said. “The coup-proofing worked brilliantly.”
(Reporting by Sarah Kinosian and Julia Symmes Cobb in Caracas and Laura Gottesdiener in Monterrey, Mexico. Editing by Stephen Eisenhammer and Michael Learmonth)
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