US jails woman who spied for Cuba

US ties with Cuba were cut four decades ago

By Rob Watson BBC Washington correspondent

An American woman has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for spying for Cuba.

Ana Belen Montes, who worked for US military intelligence, said she had wanted to defend the island against US injustice.

Montes, who is 45 and of Puerto Rican descent, worked as an analyst at the Defence Intelligence Agency near Washington.

From 1985, until her arrest in 2001, she was also a Cuban spy.

She admitted to revealing the identities of four undercover agents to the Cubans and passing on secrets prosecutors said were so sensitive they could not be revealed in court.

Dramatic defence

Prosecutors said she communicated with her Cuban handlers through short wave radio and coded pager messages.

Before being sentenced, Montes defended her actions in dramatic style.

She said the US Government's policy towards Cuba was cruel, unfair and profoundly unneighbourly.

She said she felt morally obliged to help the island defend itself from what she called US efforts to impose its values and political system.

But the judge, Ricardo Urbina was unimpressed.

He said if you can't love your country, then at the very least you should do it no wrong.