The fresh Myspace membership of many guys whoever names and you will photo suits the passports viewed by time mean that they quickly marketed ramshackle homes and you may kept the girlfriends, wives, and you may toddlers to go out of to possess Russia. Brand new recruits’ personal-mass media account emphasize this new adversity of their lives in Cuba, with posts asking to have treatments and you will offering many techniques from mobile phone bits to help you rationed chicken into black-market web sites. “On money you can pay myself,” that Cuban people told you into the videos to the WhatsApp addressed in order to Russian employers, “in the event that I’m slain or otherwise not, about I will be in a position to let my family.”
On months you to definitely accompanied, a stream of Cuban recruits started to get to Tula, with regards to the hacked data
“Dad visited Angola,” you to definitely child had written inside the a lengthy explanation regarding his decision, referencing Cuba’s deployment of greater than 50,000 “volunteers” so you’re able to Angola and Ethiopia from 1975 so you’re able to 1991 to battle within the Soviet-recognized battles. “Most of the my men ancestors have been in a few war and that i need to adhere to all of them…I am aware the idea of cannon fodder and that i do not proper care.”
Toward July 1, Russian journey Aeroflot first started operating head routes throughout the Cuban coastline city of Varadero so you’re able to Moscow. “I currently have 14 people at choices part,” Maj. Anton Valentinovich Perevozchikov, a great Russian military administrator in the city of Tula, authored during the a message for the July 18. “Passport translations try urgently needed.” The newest disperse appeared to last for at the least thirty day period. “ten more folks are on their way to see me personally now,” the fresh new officer typed on the Aug. 18. (Perevozchikov didn’t address TIME’s obtain opinion.)
In the video clips distributed to Cuban media, recruits flick by themselves on an armed forces base having their heads shaved by Russian soldiers
These types of characters and affixed data files had been into Sept. 5 of the a great Ukrainian activist hacker classification titled “Cyber Resistance UA,” which includes together with removed responsibility towards the current leakages out of hacked emails regarding Russian politicians. “The newest Cuban bodies is wanting so you can abdicate duty to possess giving the customers in order to conflict up against Ukraine,” the hacker class wrote towards the Telegram following Cuban government produced the human being-trafficking allegation. “We’re going to ‘help’ the Cuban government to remember the difficulty and you may publish the latest passports out-of two hundred mercenaries.”
Go out was able to meets at the least 20 labels towards the passports so you’re able to personal-media users. Some of the images tend to be photos of their Russian migration cards, and that county the reason behind visiting the country as “tourism.” All of the arrivals seem to have flown towards Sheremetyevo Around the world Airport into the Moscow, where numerous advertised being greeted from the Cuban soldiers. In one single photographs seen by-time, recent arrivals twist to own a good selfie on airport that have a good other Cuban sporting an armed forces consistent into the Russian banner plot, giving a beneficial thumbs-right up sign.
This new recruits don’t cover up their actions, all together you are going to predict when they was basically section of an undercover plan otherwise “trafficking” procedure. Particular altered their Twitter destination to “residing Moscow” and you can released repeated photos that have attractions and you will military technology. Half dozen photographs delivered to nearest and dearest and seen because of the Go out show Cuban recruits posing from inside the barracks otherwise carrying guns. In one, Pedro Soto RazmiЕЎljao sam o ovome Hernandez, whoever passport means your just like the a beneficial 59-year-dated indigenous regarding Granma, poses inside the a Russian armed forces uniform, flashing a leisure indication on the caption “por la madre patria.” (“With the motherland.”) One recruit’s aunt told Go out she talked so you can her nephew nearly everyday, and therefore he had been still training in Russia.
However, following the recruits’ deployment to help you Ukraine, a lot of new interaction did actually cease, ultimately causing baffled and frequently desperate texts away from friends and family back home. “I wanted lots where I could arrived at my buddy,” a female named Yanisleydy Hernandez published on July 6. “He signed up on the [Russian] Military.” Multiple recruits told Cuban news you to definitely its cell phones was in fact removed by Russian forces when they was indeed implemented, mentioning safety issues about becoming thought because of the drones. Into the an excellent July 31 article circulated for the Cuban communities towards Facebook, a private guy said he was incapable of come to their friend in Russia to share with him his sis had passed away back. “Please, cubanos, don’t be tricked from the these types of not true claims,” the man authored. “The challenge when you look at the Cuba is actually bad, but probably a war isn’t good [better] choice.”