The foreign ministry said it had taken “criminal prosecutions against those involved in these activities,” without providing details.
The Cuban government announced today that it has identified a Russian “smuggling network” that was recruiting Cubans for “military operations in Ukraine” and has brought criminal charges against those involved in the network.
The Cuban Ministry of the Interior “is making efforts to neutralize and dismantle a people-smuggling network operating from Russia to integrate Cuban citizens, living there, and even some from Cuba into the military forces involved in the military operations in Ukraine,” he said in announcement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez assured, in a message he posted on the X social network, that the Cuban government “acts with the force of the law” against these operations.
The ministry said it had taken “criminal prosecutions against the persons involved in these activities,” without giving details.
The ministry underlines that it categorically rejects the “salaried status” and reminds that Cuba is not participating in the war in Ukraine.
Miami’s America TeVe published last Friday the testimonies of two teenagers who said they were tricked through Facebook into working as builders with the Russian military at construction sites in Ukraine.
“Help us please try to get us out of here as soon as possible because we are scared“, says one of the young people, aged 19, in a video published on the newspaper’s website.
America TeVe clarifies that the young people sent this message from a bus in which they were transported from Ukraine, along with Russian military personnel, to Ryazan, southeast of Moscow.
“We can’t sleep” because “at any moment they can come back and do something to us“, another young man said, claiming he was beaten.
“I am just another Cuban who is here on contract with the Russian armed forcesanother man told this media outlet, asking not to be named, and saying he was recruited to legitimize his status in Russia.
Moscow and Havana have strengthened their diplomatic relations since last year.
In late 2022, President Miguel Díaz-Canel met his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Moscow, and delegations of businessmen and political representatives traveled to the two countries this year.
Cuban Defense Minister Alvaro López Miera met with his Russian counterpart Sergei Shoigu in June.
* File photo
Source :Skai
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