HAVANA(AP) – Cuba scolded a top U.S. delegation for meeting with political opposition leaders following high-level immigration discussions, saying Saturday that sitting down with dissidents proves Washington is out to topple its communist government.

American officials “called together dozens of their mercenaries” hours after concluding highly anticipated talks on migration issues with Cuban leaders in an undisclosed Havana location, Cuba's Foreign Ministry said.
Elizardo Sanchez, head of the independent Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation, said a group of Cuban dissident leaders met with a U.S. delegation late Friday at the residence of the head of the U.S. Interests Section, which Washington keeps in Havana because it has no diplomatic relations with the island.
Such a meeting is not unusual when U.S. diplomats visit. But enraged Cuban leaders say the dissidents are not pro-democracy activists, independent journalists and organizers of political opposition groups, but paid agents of Washington planted to destabilize the island's political system.