It is a 26 -year -old young trinitarian who integrated the 7th. Motorized rifle brigade of Russia.
Miami, United States. – The Cuban Resistance Assembly (ARC) reported that the Ukrainian armed forces captured a third Cuban citizen who fought on the Russian side. According to a statement from the organization sent to CubanetThis is Ernesto Michel Pérez Alvelaes, born on August 15, 1999 in Trinidad, Cuba, who integrated the 7th. Motorized rifles brigade.
The ARC said that Pérez Alvelaes worked as a construction worker in Moscow and joined the Russian Army on the 1st. August with the promise of reconstruction work in occupied Ukrainian areas and far from the combat lines.
“Of course this was a crude lie,” says the text, which adds that, once sent to the front, the Cuban gave himself to the Ukrainian forces after “another 10 Cubans in his unit were killed in a fight.” The statement also ensures that Pérez Alvelaes said he had seen “dozens of Russians dead in combat against Ukrainian forces.”
The ARC Enmarca is revelation in a broader political context and links it with an informative session on national security held this Thursday in El Capitol, in Washington DC, headed by Congressman Mario Díaz-Balart and with the participation of his colleagues Carlos Giménez and María Elvira Salazar.
According to the statement, in that meeting-moderate by Dr. Orlando Gutiérrez-Boronat, of the ARC-intervened from kyiv a delegation of Ukrainian authorities that presented “the high level of participation of the Castrocommunist dictatorship in the Russian genocidal aggression against Ukraine”.
The foregoing included complaints about the alleged employment of thousands of Cubans – with “already hundreds of dead” -, the direct participation of the Government of Havana in the recruitment and mobilization of these combatants, as well as alleged links with the laundering of Russian money and the “full integration” of the Cuban regime to the “axis of the evil that attacks Ukraine”.
The statement adds that the Ukrainian delegation announced measures to promote against the Cuban government, including requesting European economic sanctions and asking the Council of Europe to designate the Cuban regime as a “terrorist state.” In that same note, Gutiérrez-Boronat said: “We denounce the exploitation of the Cuban people by the Castrocommunist dictatorship by sending [sic] Young people to die at the service of Russia in a conflict that has nothing to do with the values and interests of the Cuban nation. ”
The ARC did not offer independent elements of verification about the capture of Pérez Alvelaes, beyond the testimony attributed to the detainee about its incorporation into Russian ranks and the circumstances of its surrender. However, the case adds to a pattern of information that has circulated in recent months about the presence of Cuban citizens fighting the Russian side in Ukraine.
In June 2024, It transcended The death of a Cuban identified as Camilo Ochoa, barber of the El County neighborhood, in Santa Clara. According to Martí NewsOchoa, 34, would have died from the explosion of a bomb that also killed nine other Cubans at the service of the Kremlin. “We don’t know practically anything about him. Our sister, who is in Russia is doing all the procedures. He lacked a year to finish his contract in the war,” said another of his sisters, Bárbara Ochoa.
Neighbors consulted at that time indicated that the repatriation of the body was not guaranteed. “They won’t even return the body [a su esposa]. She called the Russian embassy in Cuba and there they told her that they are going to make a mass in Russia and will pick her up some money. The wife is going back to Russia and does not know how to face that reality, ”said a neighbor who asked to protect his identity.
In February of this year, Schemes, the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) Radio Research Unit (RFE/RL) in Ukraine document the capture of Cuban citizens by the Russian army. Among the testimonies collected is that of Frank Dario Jarrosay Manfuga, 36, who was captured by Ukrainian forces and assured that he had left Cuba under deception. “I never wanted to kill anyone. I never wanted to participate in a war. I have a family.” According to that journalistic work cited, Jarrosay Manfuga would have been recruited with the promise of construction in construction and, already in Russia, forced to enlist.
Schemes research described the existence of a recruitment network, with activity in social networks such as Vkontakte and with possible training in Russian military units, including the 106th Airborne Division in Tula, which participated in the battle of Bajmut. The report included the case of a Cuban identified as Rafael, nickname Baby”The journalistic piece indicated that his profile exhibited images with patches associated with the Wagner group and that his death in combat in Bajmut was reported.
ARC attributes to the Cuban government a direct role in that network of military recruitment and logistics, an accusation that the Havana Foreign Ministry denied in September 2023.
