KYIV, Ukraine: Melodic Colombian Spanish fills a hospital treating soldiers wounded fighting Russian forces in eastern Ukraine.
Ukraine’s ranks are depleted by two years of war. As it battles the Russian war machine, Ukraine is welcoming hardened fighters from one of the world’s longest-running conflicts.
Professional soldiers from Colombia bolster the ranks of volunteers from around the world who have answered Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s call for foreign fighters to join his nation’s war with Russia.
A 32-year-old from the city of Medellin was trying to save a colleague wounded in three days of heavy fighting with Russian forces. Russian drones attacked the group and shrapnel from a grenade dropped by one pierced his jawbone.
“I thought I was going to die,” said the man, who goes by the call sign Checho. The fighters insisted on being identified by their military call signs because they feared for their safety and that of their families.
“We got up and decided to run away from the position to save our lives,” Checho said. “There was nowhere to hide.”
Colombia’s military has been fighting drug-trafficking cartels and rebel groups for decades, making its soldiers some of the world’s most experienced.
With a military of 250,000, Colombia has Latin America’s second-largest army, after Brazil’s. More than 10,000 retire each year. And hundreds are heading to fight in Ukraine, where many make four times as much as experienced non-commissioned officers earn in Colombia, or even more.
“Colombia has a large army with highly trained personnel but the pay isn’t great when you compare it to other militaries,” said Andrés Macías of Bogota’s Externado University, who studies Colombian work for military contractors around the world.
Retired Colombian soldiers began to head overseas in the early 2000s to work for US military contractors protecting infrastructure including oil wells in Iraq. Retired members of Colombia’s military have also been hired as trainers in the United Arab Emirates and joined in Yemen’s battle against Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
Colombia’s role as a recruiting ground for the global security industry also has its murkier, mercenary corners: Two Colombians were killed and 18 were arrested after they were accused of taking part in the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse.
At the military hospital normally treating wounded Ukrainian soldiers, a group of about 50 Colombian fighters spend most of their time staring at their phone screens — calling home, browsing the Internet and listening to music in between meals and medical procedures, most for light injuries.
As the two-year mark in the war approaches, Ukraine’s forces are in a stalemate with Russia’s. Ukraine is now expanding its system allowing people from around the world to join the army, said Oleksandr Shahuri, an officer of the Department of Coordination of Foreigners in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
In early 2022, authorities said 20,000 people from 52 countries were in Ukraine. Now, in keeping with the secrecy surrounding any military numbers, authorities will not say how many are on the battlefield but they do say fighters’ profile has changed.
The first waves of volunteers came mostly from post-Soviet or English-speaking countries. Speaking Russian or English made it easier for them to integrate into Ukraine’s military, Shahuri said.
Last year the military developed an infrastructure of Spanish-speaking recruiters, instructors and junior operational officers, he added.
Hector Bernal, a retired ex-combat medic who runs a center for tactical medicine outside Bogota, says that in the last eight months he’s trained more than 20 Colombians who went on to fight in Ukraine.
“They’re like the Latin American migrants who go to the US in search of a better future,” Bernal said. “These are not volunteers who want to defend another country’s flag. They are simply motivated by economic need.”
While generals in Colombia get around $6,000 a month in salaries and bonuses, the same as a government minister, the rank and file gets by on a much more modest income.
Corporals in Colombia get a basic salary of around $400 a month, while experienced drill sergeants can earn up to $900. Colombia’s monthly minimum wage is currently $330.
In Ukraine any member of the armed forces, regardless of citizenship, is entitled to a monthly salary of up to $3,300, depending on their rank and type of service. They are also entitled to up to $28,660 if they are injured, depending on the severity of the wounds. If they are killed in action, their families are due $400,000 compensation.
Checho says principle drove him to travel to Kyiv last September. He estimates that in his unit alone, there were around 100 other fighters from Colombia who had made the same journey.
“I know that there are not many of us, but we try to give the most we have in order to make things happen and to see a change as soon as possible,” he said.
In Colombia, word about recruitment to the Ukrainian army spreads mostly through social media. Some of the volunteers who already fight in Ukraine share insights on the recruitment process on platforms such as TikTok or WhatsApp.
But when something goes wrong, getting information about their loved ones is hard for relatives.
Diego Espitia lost contact with his cousin Oscar Triana after Triana joined the Ukrainian army in August 2023. Six weeks later, the retired soldier from Bogota stopped posting updates on social media.
With no Ukrainian embassy in Bogota, Triana’s family reached out for information from the Ukrainian embassy in Peru and the Colombian consulate in Poland — the last country Triana passed through on his way into Ukraine. Neither responded.
“We want the authorities in both countries to give us information about what happened, to respond to our emails. That is what we are demanding now,” Espitia said.
The Associated Press tracked down a Colombian fighter who uses the call sign Oso Polar — Polar Bear — and says he was the last person to see Triana alive on October 8, 2023. He says Triana’s unit was ambushed by Russian forces in the Kharkiv region, after which his fate was unknown.
The Ukrainian military unit where Triana was serving confirmed to The Associated Press that Triana is officially missing, but would not disclose any details surrounding the circumstances in which he disappeared.
Espitia, his cousin, says he’s not sure what motivated Triana to fight in Ukraine. But the 43-year-old had served in the Colombian army for more than 20 years and leaving it had been “mentally difficult,” Espitia said.
“It could’ve been for the money, or because he missed the adrenaline of being in combat. But he didn’t open up very much about his reasons for going,” Espitia said.
After almost three weeks in the hospital, Checho has returned to Ukraine’s front line. So have more than 50 other Colombian fighters who were treated in the same facility.
“The situation here is hard,” Checho told AP. “We are under constant bombardment, but we will keep fighting.”
Ukraine needs more troops to fight Russia. Hardened professionals from Colombia are helping
https://arab.news/vkj2s
Ukraine needs more troops to fight Russia. Hardened professionals from Colombia are helping
Croatia issues Serbia travel warning after saying nationals expelled
- The Croatian foreign ministry alleged “inappropriate and unfounded actions of Serbian authorities toward Croatian nationals“
- Foreign Minister Gordan Grlic Radman on Wednesday said he would send a protest note to Serbia
ZAGREB: Croatia on Thursday recommended its nationals postpone non-essential travel to Serbia, alleging Belgrade had expelled five Croatian women citing security reasons.
The Croatian foreign ministry alleged “inappropriate and unfounded actions of Serbian authorities toward Croatian nationals,” in a statement.
Other Croatians had previously been accused of taking part in a recent wave of protests against Serbia’s nationalist government in an separate case.
Foreign Minister Gordan Grlic Radman on Wednesday said he would send a protest note to Serbia over the “detention of five Croatian women” there who all returned home safely.
He said the five attended a workshop involving NGOs organized by Austria’s Erste Bank foundation and were “detained without any explanation.”
He said Zagreb will inform the European Union delegation in Belgrade about Serbian authorities’ actions, “which put Croatian citizens in a humiliating position.”
Serbia’s foreign ministry said it was “inappropriate” for a Croatian official to “accuse Serbia of endangering the freedom of movement and speech of several Croatian nationals.”
The latter were “treated in Belgrade by the competent state bodies in line with legal procedures and usual international practice,” it said in a statement without elaborating.
Serbia’s interior ministry did not reply to AFP’s request for comment.
Ana Kovacic, an art historian from Zagreb who took part in the two-day workshop, told the newspaper Jutarnji list that it was attended by around 15 people from Bosnia, Croatia, North Macedonia, Romania and Slovenia.
After it ended, the participants were taken from their hotel to a police station where they were interrogated, she said.
They were given a document to sign saying that they were “threatening the security of the Republic of Serbia,” should leave the country within 24 hours and were banned from entering it for a year.
Croatian and Serbian human rights groups condemned the actions of the Serbian police, who they said “arrested and deported several persons” from those countries, describing those arrested as “activists.”
Two workshop participants from Albania also told local media in their country that they suffered the same treatment.
The Albanian foreign ministry said on Thursday it had summoned the Serbian ambassador over the case.
It “expressed regret and serious concerns regarding the detention” of the two, describing them as “representatives of civil society who participated in a seminar in Belgrade.”
Serbia has been rocked by regular protests since a deadly disaster at a train station in November ignited longstanding anger over corruption.
High-ranking Serbian government officials, without providing evidence, have claimed in their statements that the student blockades and protests are “influenced by Western intelligence agencies” with the aim of “overthrowing President Aleksandar Vucic.”
At the end of December, tabloid media close to the Serbian authorities accused a group of Croatian students of participating in the protests.
Ties between two former Yugoslav republics remain frosty since Croatia’s 1990s war of independence against Belgrade-backed rebel Serbs.
A federal judge temporarily blocks Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship
- US District Judge John Coughenour repeatedly interrupted a Justice Department lawyer during arguments to ask how he could consider the order constitutional
- The case is one of five lawsuits being brought by 22 states and a number of immigrants rights groups across the country
SEATTLE: A federal judge in Seattle on Thursday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s executive order ending the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship, calling it “blatantly unconstitutional” during the first hearing in a multi-state effort challenging the order.
US District Judge John Coughenour repeatedly interrupted a Justice Department lawyer during arguments to ask how he could consider the order constitutional. When the attorney, Brett Shumate, said he’d like a chance to explain it in a full briefing, Coughenour told him the hearing was his chance.
The temporary restraining order sought by Arizona, Illinois, Oregon and Washington was the first to get a hearing before a judge and applies nationally.
The case is one of five lawsuits being brought by 22 states and a number of immigrants rights groups across the country. The suits include personal testimonies from attorneys general who are US citizens by birthright, and names pregnant women who are afraid their children won’t become US citizens.
Coughenour, a Ronald Reagan appointee, began the hearing by grilling the administration’s attorneys, saying the order “boggles the mind.”
“This is a blatantly unconstitutional order,” Coughenour told Shumate. Coughenour said he’s been on the bench for more than four decades, and he couldn’t remember seeing another case where the action challenged was so clearly unconstitutional.
Shumate said he respectfully disagreed and asked the judge for an opportunity to have a full briefing on the merits of the case, rather than have a 14-day restraining order issued blocking its implementation.
Trump’s executive order, which he signed on Inauguration Day, is slated to take effect on Feb. 19. It could impact hundreds of thousands of people born in the country, according to one of the lawsuits. In 2022, there were about 255,000 births of citizen children to mothers living in the country illegally and about 153,000 births to two such parents, according to the four-state suit filed in Seattle.
The Trump administration argued in papers filed Wednesday that the states don’t have grounds to bring a suit against the order and that no damage has yet been done, so temporary relief isn’t called for. The administration’s attorneys also clarified that the executive order only applies to people born after Feb. 19, when it’s set to take effect.
The US is among about 30 countries where birthright citizenship — the principle of jus soli or “right of the soil” — is applied. Most are in the Americas, and Canada and Mexico are among them.
The lawsuits argue that the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees citizenship for people born and naturalized in the US, and states have been interpreting the amendment that way for a century.
Ratified in 1868 in the aftermath of the Civil War, the amendment says: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Trump’s order asserts that the children of noncitizens are not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, and orders federal agencies to not recognize citizenship for children who don’t have at least one parent who is a citizen .
A key case involving birthright citizenship unfolded in 1898. The Supreme Court held that Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to Chinese immigrants, was a US citizen because he was born in the country. After a trip abroad, he faced being denied reentry by the federal government on the grounds that he wasn’t a citizen under the Chinese Exclusion Act.
But some advocates of immigration restrictions have argued that case clearly applied to children born to parents who were both legal immigrants. They say it’s less clear whether it applies to children born to parents living in the country illegally.
Trump’s order prompted attorneys general to share their personal connections to birthright citizenship. Connecticut Attorney General William Tong, for instance, a US citizen by birthright and the nation’s first Chinese American elected attorney general, said the lawsuit was personal for him.
“There is no legitimate legal debate on this question. But the fact that Trump is dead wrong will not prevent him from inflicting serious harm right now on American families like my own,” Tong said this week.
One of the lawsuits aimed at blocking the executive order includes the case of a pregnant woman, identified as “Carmen,” who is not a citizen but has lived in the United States for more than 15 years and has a pending visa application that could lead to permanent residency status.
“Stripping children of the ‘priceless treasure’ of citizenship is a grave injury,” the suit says. “It denies them the full membership in US society to which they are entitled.”
Spain says over 550 migrants reached its Canary Islands in 2 days
- The Spanish archipelago off northwest Africa is continuing to experience large numbers of migrant arrivals as more people mainly from West Africa
- In the first half of January, 3,409 migrants reached Spain by sea
MADRID: More than 550 migrants have arrived in Spain’s Canary Islands in boats over the past two days, Spain’s maritime rescue service said Thursday. At least one body was found in one of the boats.
The Spanish archipelago off northwest Africa is continuing to experience large numbers of migrant arrivals as more people mainly from West Africa attempt the dangerous Atlantic crossing in ramshackle boats.
In the first half of January, 3,409 migrants reached Spain by sea, the vast majority to the Canaries, Interior Ministry figures showed. About as many migrants came illegally during the same period last year.
In 2024, Spain received a record number of migrants who crossed illegally via sea, with more than 61,000 people having arrived on boats. Nearly 47,000 of those landed in the Canary Islands. They included several thousand unaccompanied minors.
The islands are roughly 65 miles (105 kilometers) from the closest point in Africa, but to avoid security forces, many migrants attempt longer journeys that can take days or weeks. The majority last year departed from Mauritania, which is at least 473 miles (762 kilometers) from the closest Canary Island, El Hierro.
Earlier this month, the Spanish migration rights group Caminando Fronteras (Walking Borders) said that 50 people had died in the capsizing of a boat on its way to the Canary Islands. It reported that 44 of them were from Pakistan.
The European Union’s border agency, Frontex, said irregular crossings into the bloc in 2024 fell 38 percent overall but rose by 18 percent on the Atlantic route between West Africa and the Canary Islands. It attributed the rise in part to more migrants leaving from Mauritania, which has become a primary point of departure for people attempting to reach Europe.
The International Organization for Migration recorded at least 5,000 migrants who died or went missing on the migratory route since it began keeping records in 2014. But Caminando Fronteras (Walking Borders) says the real death toll is significantly higher, and that over 10,000 people died or went missing while attempting the route last year alone.
Caminando Fronteras says it compiles its own figures from families of migrants and rescue statistics.
ICC prosecutor seeks arrest of Taliban leaders over persecution of women
- ICC judges will consider Khan’s application before deciding whether to issue warrants, a process that could take weeks or even months
- After coming to power in 2021, Taliban quickly imposed restrictions on women and girls that United Nations has called “gender apartheid“
THE HAGUE: The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor on Thursday said he was seeking arrest warrants against senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan over the persecution of women, a crime against humanity.
Karim Khan said there were reasonable grounds to suspect that Supreme Leader Haibatullah Akhundzada and chief justice Abdul Hakim Haqqani “bear criminal responsibility for the crime against humanity of persecution on gender grounds.”
Khan said that Afghan women and girls, as well as the LGBTQ community, were facing “an unprecedented, unconscionable and ongoing persecution by the Taliban.
“Our action signals that the status quo for women and girls in Afghanistan is not acceptable,” added Khan.
ICC judges will now consider Khan’s application before deciding whether to issue the warrants — a process that could take weeks or even months.
The court, based in The Hague, was set up to rule on the world’s worst crimes, such as war crimes and crimes against humanity.
It has no police force of its own and relies on its 125 member states to carry out its warrants — with mixed results.
In theory this means that anyone subject to an ICC arrest warrant cannot travel to a member state for fear of being detained.
Khan warned he would soon be seeking additional applications for other Taliban officials.
Akhundzada inherited the Taliban leadership in May 2016 after a US drone strike in Pakistan killed his predecessor.
Believed to be in his 60s or 70s, the reclusive supreme leader rules by decree from the Taliban movement’s birthplace in southern Kandahar.
Haqqani was a close associate of Taliban founder Mullah Omar and served as a negotiator during discussions with US representatives in 2020.
ICC prosecutor Khan argued the Taliban was “brutally” repressing resistance through crimes “including murder, imprisonment, torture, rape and other forms of sexual violence, enforced disappearance, and other inhumane acts.”
Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement the prosecutor’s actions should put the Taliban’s exclusion of women and girls from public life back on the international agenda.
“This is an important moment for Afghan women and girls who have been waiting much too long for justice,” HRW’s women’s rights deputy director, Heather Barr, told AFP, calling for “other efforts to hold the Taliban fully accountable.”
The move was praised by Afghan women activists, including Shukria Barakzai, an Afghan former lawmaker and the ousted government’s ex-ambassador to Norway.
“It’s a victory,” she told AFP from London.
“This also could be counted as (an) important achievement for feminism globally... and particularly for women in Afghanistan.”
The UN special rapporteur for human rights in Afghanistan, Richard Bennett, called the move “a crucial step... for accountability in Afghanistan” on X.
After sweeping back to power in August 2021, the Taliban authorities pledged a softer rule than their first rein from 1996-2001. But they quickly imposed restrictions on women and girls that the United Nations has labelled “gender apartheid.”
Edicts in line with their interpretation of Islamic law have squeezed women and girls from public life.
They have barred girls from secondary school and women from university, making Afghanistan the only country in the world to impose such bans.
Taliban authorities imposed restrictions on women working for non-governmental groups and other employment, with thousands of women losing government jobs — or being paid to stay at home.
Beauty salons have been closed and women blocked from visiting public parks, gyms and baths as well as traveling long distances without a male chaperone.
A “vice and virtue” law announced last summer ordered women not to sing or recite poetry in public and for their voices and bodies to be “concealed” outside the home.
The few remaining women TV presenters wear tight headscarves and face masks in line with a 2022 diktat by Akhundzada that women cover everything but their eyes and hands in public.
The international community has condemned the restrictions, which remain a key sticking point in the Taliban authorities’ pursuit of official recognition, which it has not received from any state.
The Taliban authorities have dismissed international criticism of their policies, saying all citizens’ rights are provided for under Islamic law.
UK court hears horrific details of Southport girls’ murders as killer removed from dock
- After Judge Julian Goose refused to adjourn the sentencing, Rudakubana shouted “don’t continue,” prompting the judge to have him removed
- Someone shouted “coward” as he left
LONDON: A British teenager who murdered three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance event was obsessed with violence and genocide, prosecutors said on Thursday after the killer was removed for repeatedly interrupting his sentencing.
Axel Rudakubana, 18, killed the three girls at a Taylor Swift-themed summer vacation event last July, with two of them suffering “horrific injuries which ... are difficult to explain as anything other than sadistic in nature,” prosecutor Deanna Heer said.
Rudakubana was removed from the dock at Liverpool Crown Court shortly after the start of his sentencing after shouting from the dock that he was unwell and suffering chest pains.
After Judge Julian Goose refused to adjourn the sentencing, Rudakubana shouted “don’t continue,” prompting the judge to have him removed. Someone shouted “coward” as he left.
On Monday, Rudakubana admitted carrying out the killings, in the northern English town of Southport, an atrocity that was followed by days of nationwide rioting.
He murdered Bebe King, 6, Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7, and Alice Dasilva Aguiar, 9, with two of the girls suffering at least 85 and 122 sharp force injuries, Heer said.
The prosecutor described a scene of horror, with the court shown video footage of screaming young girls fleeing the building. One bloodied girl was seen collapsing outside, provoking gasps and sobs from the public gallery.
He has also pleaded guilty to 10 charges of attempted murder relating to the attack, as well as to producing the deadly poison ricin and possessing an Al-Qaeda training manual.
Before Rudakubana’s outburst, Heer had said he was not inspired by any political or religious ideology.
“His only purpose was to kill and he targeted the youngest, most vulnerable in order to spread the greatest level of fear and outrage, which he succeeded in doing.” she said.
“Whilst under arrest at the police station after the incident, Axel Rudakubana was heard to say ‘It’s a good thing those children are dead ... I’m so glad ... so happy’.”
Heer said images and documents found on a computer at his home showed “he had a long-standing obsession with violence, killing and genocide.”
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said there were “grave questions” for the state to answer as to why the murders took place.
The government has announced a public inquiry into the case after it said Rudakubana had been referred three times to Prevent, a counter-radicalization scheme, but no action had been taken.
Starmer has said the attack could show that Britain faces a new type of terrorism threat waged by “loners, misfits, young men in their bedrooms” committing extreme violence.
