By David A. Vise
                  Washington Post Staff Writer
 

                  Eight days ago, Mariano Faget, an immigration supervisor in Miami born in
                  Havana, was summoned to a meeting with senior U.S. officials who sought
                  his advice on the imminent defection to the United States of a high-ranking
                  Cuban intelligence officer and then asked him to prepare asylum papers.

                  Twelve minutes after the meeting, according to documents filed in federal
                  court, Faget, 54, returned to his office, grabbed his personal cell phone
                  and called a New York businessman, telling him that "one of the ones
                  working with the Americans" is "a person we both know." What Faget
                  didn't know was that he was the target of a sting, code-named "Operation
                  False Blue," and that FBI agents were listening to him as he tipped the
                  New Yorker, who was about to meet with a Cuban intelligence officer.

                  Yesterday, Faget's 34-year career as a U.S. immigration official with
                  access to classified information about law enforcement sources and Cuban
                  defectors ended, as his alleged life as a Cuban spy was revealed in court
                  papers filed by the U.S. attorney's office in Miami. Through technical and
                  physical surveillance and videotaping, the FBI said it had watched Faget,
                  now in custody, making unauthorized contacts with Cuban intelligence
                  officers in Miami, with an official in the Cuban diplomatic mission in
                  Washington and with the New York businessman.

                  Faget, who carried a "secret" security clearance and was responsible for
                  supervising naturalization decisions and requests for political asylum in
                  Miami, is the first Immigration and Naturalization Service official to be
                  charged with spying.

                  "His reputation has always been excellent," one stunned former intelligence
                  officer said. "He was the last person in the world you would have thought
                  of as being part of something like this. He was thoroughly professional and
                  from all appearances was 100 percent pro-American."

                  FBI assistant special agent Paul Mallett said during a news conference in
                  Miami that Faget's alleged espionage could compromise national security
                  and that additional arrests were expected in the continuing probe, which
                  began about a year ago.

                  The case "speaks to the heart of public trust," said Bob Wallis, INS
                  director for the district that includes Miami, adding that Faget was arrested
                  soon after the sting because he was nearing retirement and appeared to be
                  on his way to work more closely with Cuban agents.

                  "The real importance of it from a counterintelligence standpoint is that the
                  Cubans are one of the most effective intelligence services in the world, and
                  to interrupt one of their operations is significant," a U.S. official familiar
                  with the case said. "The Cubans are very, very good."

                  The Cuban Interests Section in Washington released a statement yesterday
                  calling the claims about Faget "a colossal slander." "The Cuban Interests
                  Section categorically denies this accusation," the statement said.

                  The probe, dubbed "False Blue" as a play on the patriotic expression "True
                  Blue," is likely to further strain U.S.-Cuban relations at a time when they
                  have been tested by the controversy surrounding the case of 6-year-old
                  Elian Gonzalez.

                  At a preliminary hearing before U.S. District Judge Stephen T. Brown in
                  Miami yesterday, Faget appeared puffy and pale, wearing tan prison-issue
                  scrubs, plastic slippers with socks, leg irons and handcuffs. He entered no
                  plea as more than 40 of Faget's family and friends waited in the courtyard
                  to post property as bond and to testify to his character.

                  But the judge ruled that Faget, who began work as a clerk and rose to a
                  high-level immigration official with an $82,107 salary, should be held,
                  pending a bond hearing next week.

                  The FBI has recommended to the State Department that a contact of
                  Faget's at the Cuban diplomatic mission be asked to leave the country, a
                  Clinton administration official told the Associated Press, speaking on the
                  condition of anonymity. A spokesman for the Cuban Interests Section
                  declined to comment.

                  Federal officials did not reveal the name of the New York businessman or
                  what secrets Faget had allegedly divulged. But they suggested that Faget
                  might have been rewarded for his efforts by the New Yorker, who made
                  him vice president and secretary of a corporation apparently set up to do
                  business with Cuba.

                  Faget's father, Mariano Faget Sr., was described by the Miami Herald as
                  a hunter and torturer of suspected communists for the government of
                  Fulgencio Batista, who was overthrown by current Cuban President Fidel
                  Castro. In "Diary of the Cuban Revolution," writer Carlos Franqui said
                  Faget Sr. "had worked with the FBI in the United States."

                  The United States broke off diplomatic relations with Cuba in 1961, about
                  two years after Castro's communist regime rose to power.

                  The Fagets sought political asylum in the United States in 1960, and the
                  son became a U.S. citizen on Nov. 22, 1963, according to El Neuvo
                  Herald.

                  If convicted, he faces the possibility of 15 years in prison, hundreds of
                  thousands of dollars in fines and the potential loss of his federal retirement
                  pay.

                  Staff writers Lorraine Adams and Karen DeYoung in Washington and
                  special correspondent Catharine Skipp in Miami contributed to this report.

                           © Copyright 2000 The Washington Post Company