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Bolivia charges US official with spying

Criminal charges of espionage have been filed against a US embassy official accused of asking an American student and some Peace Corps volunteers to keep tabs on Venezuelan and Cuban workers in Bolivia.

Bolivian Vice Minister of Government Ruben Gamarra, who filed the charges this week, said on Thursday that the government may ask the US to provide a statement from the embassy security official, Vincent Cooper.

Also on Thursday, the Bolivian Senate said it would form a committee to investigate the charges against Cooper.

The charges carry a sentence of 30 years in prison without parole. It was unclear on Thursday whether diplomatic immunity would protect him under Bolivian and international law.

In a Wednesday meeting, US Ambassador Philip Goldberg and Foreign Minister David Choquehuanca agreed that Cooper would not return to Bolivia.

Fulbright scholar Alex van Schaick told The Associated Press last week that during a one-on-one security briefing in November, Cooper asked him to pass along information on Venezuelan and Cuban workers he encountered in the country.

Four months earlier, embassy officials said, Cooper mistakenly gave a group of newly arrived Peace Corps volunteers a security briefing meant only for embassy staff, asking them only to report "suspicious activities."

Bolivian President Evo Morales on Thursday praised van Schaick for coming forward despite the risk to his reputation.

"I salute this American for denouncing the spying [his government] does," the president said.

The embassy case has fed an ongoing spying controversy in Bolivia.

Last month, materials anonymously leaked to various media appeared to show police spying on prominent, anti-Morales politicians.

Morales, in turn, shut down a US-backed police intelligence unit he accused of operating outside Bolivian government control.
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