Shorouk Express
Two Colombian men who fought for Ukraine were “kidnapped” by Vladimir Putin in Venezuela and locked up in a Russian prison, according to reports.
Alexander Ante, 46 and Jose Aranda, 37, were snatched as they passed through Venezuela’s capital Caracas and extradited to Russia while travelling home from Ukraine’s front line, according to The Daily Telegraph .
Mr Ante joined Kyiv’s controversial 49th Infantry Battalion Karpatska Sic – with a neo-Nazi history – in 2023, drawing upon his experience fighting guerrillas in the Colombian army.
By June 2024, he was heading home, but disappeared shortly after telling his mother to keep some sancocho (Colombian stew) for him.
After 43 long days of frantic searching by his family, Mr Ante reappeared in a video alongside Mr Aranda published by Russia state media channel RT reporting they were being held in Moscow as punishment.
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The pair read out their names and the battalion. Foreign soldiers fighting for Karpatska Sic can earn between $2,400 to £3,200 a month.
In the footage, handcuffed and flanked by two balaclava-clad guards, Mr Aranda emerges from a cell. Trembling and avoiding the camera’s gaze, Mr Ante identifies himself.
Mr Aranda, who also fought in the battalion, sent a video of himself boarding in Madrid with Alexander, followed hours later by a location pin from Venezuela’s Caracas Airport.
He had planned to return to Popayán in time for the weekend to celebrate his 37th birthday. But José Aron never arrived, and he never received his wife’s worried text messages.
Since then, neither family has managed to contact the men or speak to the court-appointed lawyer assigned by Russia.
“I’m tired of living. I don’t know what else to do, always thinking about my son,” Mr Ante’s mother Otilia, told The Daily Telegraph.
“I don’t know if he’s cold, if he’s hungry, or how they’re treating him. I know nothing. It’s so hard… Sometimes I wish I could catch a plane and leave, but where could I go?”
Venezuela and Russia have maintained diplomatic silence. RT claims Russian intelligence captured the men without specifying where.
Alexander and José Aron are now serving half a year “on remand”, and face a possible 12 to 18 years in prison for “being mercenaries”, according to the Colombian ambassador to Russia Héctor Arenas Neira.
