HAVANA (AFP) – Cuba has identified an alleged human trafficking ring aimed at recruiting its citizens to fight in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the Foreign Ministry said yesterday.
The government was working to dismantle a “trafficking network that operates from Russia to incorporate Cuban citizens living there, and even some from Cuba, into the military forces involved in military operations in Ukraine”, the ministry said in a statement.
The Cuban government had initiated criminal proceedings against those carrying out the trafficking, it added.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that the government was “acting with the full force of the law” against trafficking operations. “Cuba is not part of the conflict in Ukraine,” the ministry said, adding it would take action against anyone “who participates in any form of human trafficking for the purpose of recruitment or mercenarism for Cuban citizens to use arms against any country”.
There was no immediate reaction from Moscow.
Last Friday, Miami’s America TeVe newspaper published what it described as testimonies from two teenagers who said they had been tricked into working alongside the Russian army on construction sites in Ukraine.
In a video message posted on the newspaper’s website, one of the teens called for help getting out as quickly as possible.
