Perhaps the most powerful monument to casualties of Russia’s full-scale invasion lies at Maidan Nezalezhnosti, the large Independence Square in central Kyiv.
A sea of yellow and blue has surged there in recent years, flooding one corner with tribute flags and framed photographs. This space appeared organically – literally amidst the grass roots – in response to family and friends of fallen soldiers needing to remember them, somehow.
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One section does not quite fit in, however.
Many yellow and blue flags here bear an additional red stripe. A diverse community of faces stares back from their pictures, with an ethnic twist. This barrio is majority Colombian, with some Brazilians and the odd Peruvian.
Handwritten messages on the reverse of these photo frames are very touching, more so in a language that I can read and understand. “Brother, I was hurt by your death,” one reads.
“I will always remember the words that you told me before dying.”
Elsewhere on the frame, I find the word “Gloria,” a glory so omnipresent with the Ukrainian “Slava.” It is also the second word of the Colombian national anthem: “Oh Gloria inmarcesible” – the glory that does not fade.
So what might a Ukrainian think when confronted with row upon row of dead Colombians? And exactly why did thousands of Colombians come to fight in Ukraine in the first place?
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The Colombian context
The peace process in 2016 supposedly ended the armed conflict in Colombia, after over 50 years of fighting, earning the then-President Juan Manuel Santos a Nobel Prize.
Perhaps Colombia has spent decades training more fighters than it currently needs. Are there now generations of soldiers looking for a new role?
Not exactly. For one, the situation in Colombia is far from resolved: The once ideological guerrilla warfare merged with drug trafficking a good while ago. Violence has returned to some regions of the country, so the Armed Forces still remain critical to stability – especially as national tourism grows from strength to strength.
Critics of the current leftist President Gustavo Petro – himself a former member of the Marxist M19 guerrilla group – feel he is getting a little too cosy with coca production in Colombia. The latest peace manoeuvre recommends buying coca leaves directly from farmers to redistribute income. Army soldiers, however, who often lean towards the right, have found such strategies hugely demoralizing.
Additionally, Petro’s government has cut military benefits, leaving many soldiers demotivated and financially strained – yet still equipped with the kind of combat experience and skills Ukraine’s Armed Forces (AFU) are actively seeking.
Soldier Danilo
A sign of the growing number of Colombians in Ukraine is how easily they can cross one’s path.
One such example was Danilo, whom I met one afternoon whilst documenting the most recently framed photos at Maidan Nezalezhnosti.
Danilo is a lovely young man from Norte de Santander. He had been a youth cycling champion in his teens back home but could not afford the training required to become a sports coach. Instead, he completed a year of military service before taking a financial decision to head to Ukraine.
“Many of my compatriots come chasing money but then run away the moment they grasp the reality of this war,” Danilo said. “Not me. I am firm and committed to Ukraine. I love this beautiful land.”
In addition to the small emblem on his T-shirt, I was shown a beautiful trident tattooed on his forearm.
When asked to pose, Danilo immediately picked up the picture frames of two fallen friends – callsign “Guerrero” (warrior) and callsign “Máximo,” the friends he had come to spend time with. This must be a tough existence for a 21-year-old – far younger than the vast majority of Ukrainian soldiers (conscripted from the age of 25+).
Danilo had joined the 4th Battalion of the 66th Brigade, which was entirely Hispanic: Colombians, Paraguayans and Spanish. I asked if his physical fitness or coordination as a former athlete contributed to his survival, but he did not believe so.
“I really believe in destiny. Most of my friends have died because… I am standing here, and a soldier falls dead there. The drone attacked there and, luckily, I was here”, he said.
“But I have always been at the frontline, which is very tricky.”
The brigade had since disbanded due to “logistics,” a euphemism for the inevitable restructuring that occurs to compensate for lost soldiers. He finds himself on leave for a few months without pay.
He does not speak English or Ukrainian but is learning the latter. Danilo’s future is uncertain.
“Those friends who died didn’t even manage to receive their first salary”, he said. “It makes me wonder.” Danilo relays how some Colombian soldiers complain that they are yet to be paid, while others feel they have been taken advantage of, hired on lies. It can get quite complicated for new Latin recruits.
Danilo is grateful that he has always been paid on time and has only felt respect from the Ukrainians he has worked with. He hopes to save enough to apply for a US visa at some point and even serve in the US Army if they will accept him.
The Mourning widow
On another visit to Maidan, I noticed a woman watching me intently from a distance. I asked if she spoke Spanish, and she explained that she was a widow, following the footsteps of her late husband Edwin Alexánder.
She pointed out his picture frame, which I had been photographing minutes earlier. He had died in combat in Ukraine aged 33, but his body has not been recovered. She agreed to pose for me if her face was turned away.
She shared that they had two young children in the Comuna 13 in Medellín. While her neighborhood has gentrified in recent years, with street art tours and stunning panoramic views, most of it remains an underdeveloped favela, and that is the part where she lives.
Hence the tremendous irony that her husband travelled a long distance to Ukraine from one of the poorest corners of Colombia, at great personal expense in dollars (let alone in pesos), to work hard and save up for a better future for their family. Not only was he unable to reap the benefits of the military salary he pursued, but with a missing body, his widow was not even able to process the compensation claim. This is in addition to her own considerable expense in making the journey from Antioquia to Kyiv.
I can only imagine the heartbreak of becoming a widow, followed by the frustration of attempting to manage the consequences from afar, only to chase bureaucracy and dead ends once actually present in Ukrainian institutions. She said that it had been hell for her; a solitary and exhausting fortnight in a country where she had hoped to find justice but could not even speak the language.
She was returning to Colombia the next day – and I wish I’d known what else to say, as I gave her a firm hug.
Soldier Castaño
The fate of the widow’s late husband chimed with Castaño, an accomplished Colombian marine I crossed paths with some weeks later. Castaño had suffered the terrible misfortune of joining the 59th Brigade.
“Lies. So many lies and falsified documents,” Castaño said. “We were sent to the front line without the right papers. A friend died recently, but without a missing stamp his contract was never activated. So we don’t know how to help his family.”
“Sixty of us Colombians arrived in May [2024]. Twelve were killed on the very first day. Soon after, twenty-something were injured,” Castaño continued. “But they would not recover the bodies. I’m tired of us getting killed and the Ukrainian military never collecting the bodies.”
Without a body, there can be no compensation. Worse still, Castaño has seen evidence of the incomplete papers of these deceased soldiers getting burned. If they are erased, then they were never there in the first place.
No need to pay salaries, let alone additional compensation.
“This is highly irregular,” he says. “Foreigners come in and die. It’s a dirty business for some.”
In response, Castaño requested redeployment from the 59th Brigade, becoming a drone operator with the 37th Brigade – a positive and professional environment, akin to where Danilo had served.
Eternal Glory?
Castaño’s old brigade number, 59, appears 11 times on a notably large Colombian flag at Maidan Nezalezhnosti. Ukrainian observers will recognize the military reference and will generally appreciate the tradition of flag-signing in which they themselves partake.
Colombian observers, however, would see a rather different picture.
Of those listed, many victims’ callsigns are expressed in a Colombian dialect of Spanish. They sound all too familiar and relatable, and hence somewhat heartbreaking. We can read “Rolo” (an exonym for someone from Bogotá), “Tigre” and “Tigrillo” (tiger and ocelot), “Cauca” and “Guajiro” (from respective departments of Colombia) and “Dínamo” (which might actually be a football reference!).
Elsewhere on the flag we find “Paisano” (a fellow countryman, i.e., a Colombian), “Gato” (cat, a common nickname), “Cuchillo” (knife) and even “Rolistón” (a phonetical Rolling Stone).
There is a desire for fallen Colombian soldiers to be remembered, but also for them to be recognized (not to mention, processed). As things stand, most Ukrainians are unaware of the significant contribution that they have made. Hopefully this will gradually shift, but in the meantime…
Glory to the Colombians!
Author’s note: With special thanks to Danilo & Castaño, and the mourning widow. Dedicated to the memory of Edwin Alexánder (y tantos más… ).
This is the first installment in a special weekly series examining the role of Colombian fighters in Ukraine’s battle against Russia’s invasion. Stay tuned for more.