Critics, spies and more questions on US-Cuba diplomatic talks

Update 12/19/14 — 10 a.m. –

Family members of Rolando Sarraff Trujillo have told several news outlets in Miami, including “El Nuevo Herald” and “Univision 23″ that they haven’t heard of his whereabouts since Alan Gross was released by the Cuban government on Wednesday.

They say he has disappeared from prison “without a trace,” and if it really was him who was released in this historic exchange between the US and the Cuban government, they’re waiting for someone to call them and let them know what has happened.

Vilma Sarraff, who resides in Spain, spoke to journalist Miguel Sanchez: “The only thing that he told him (my dad) is that my brother wasn’t there, that they took him out at midnight. Nothing else. Nobody knows where my brother is…no one tells us anything.”

In this Spanish-language video aired by local Miami TV Station America TV, Sarraff-Trujillo’s sister talks from Spain saying she’s desperate to find out about her brother’s whereabouts:

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Thursday the name of a reported Cuban spy who was freed after working as a double agent for the United States and Cuba has surfaced in some news outlets, fueling speculation about the secret diplomatic wrangling that went on between both the US and Cuba in order to broker Alan Gross’s release.

SEE ALSO: Cuba deals worry some Cubans, insults others

The announcement that Rolando “Roly” Sarraff Trujillo might be the spy Cuba released on Wednesday was made by several news outlets, including MSNBC. Caught and imprisoned for two decades, the U.S. agent “is now safely on our shores,” President Obama told reporters. However, both governments remain tight-lipped about the agent who was released after spending two decades in Cuban prison. In a conference call with reporters on Wednesday, just before the announcement about Alan Gross’s release was made, White House officials said they would not identify the “intelligence asset.”

“If the U.S. government has its way, the man’s identity and location will be secret for years, at least until his death,” USA Today reported.

Who is the US spy freed by Cuba?

News reports describe Sarraff Trujillo as a former cryptographer in Cuba’s Directorate of Intelligence who acted as an agent for the Central Intelligence Agency, but other than that not much else is publicly known, and Raul Castro has stayed equally mum on the subject.

This announcement could be a game-changer for hardliners who still support the blockade to bring about democratic and economic reform on the Communist island on the grounds that Alan Gross being freed was the result of an uneven exchange between both nations. Gross was a contractor working for USAID, bringing cell phones and other communication equipment to Cuba’s Jewish community, an act that in the eyes of the Cuban government is subversive.

Gross was released at the same time that the US government released the three Cubans who remained in American prison serving out the remainder of their sentences after being convicted spies for the Cuban government–originally, five were convicted by the federal government.

Thursday, surviving family members of Brothers to the Rescue–the Cuban exile group that had four planes shot down while performing recognizance to find rafters off Cuban waters–gathered to denounce what they say was a raw deal for the Cuban government. The five spies of the so-called “Wasp Network” (Red Avispa) were instrumental in gathering information that led to the shooting of the planes.

“We were so heartbroken yesterday when we heard the news; in fact we were shocked, just trying to absorb what had happened…that an innocent man would be traded for a spy,” said Myriam de la Peña in a press conference as she cried, flanked by Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.

Her son, Mario Manuel de la Peña, was one of the four pilots who died in the shootdown of the small planes by Cuban MIGs on the fateful day in 1996.

“It’s like murder all over again,” de la Peña said the day before in another press conference.

The release of an an American spy by Cuba might not be enough to change the sentiment of de la Peña and the other relatives whose loved ones were killed by the Cuban air force. However, until more details on this man who was released to the US are made public, it’ll be tough to predict whether it’s enough to change the opinion of critics who think the US got a raw deal in this exchange with Cuba.

SEE ALSO: Raul Castro to Obama: Thanks Barack. Now end the sanctions

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