A newspaper in Colombia has reported a drugs-for-guns arrangement involving the country's two main guerrilla organizations and the Russian Mafia, in a case which highlights both the close relationship between the rebels and increasing influence of European organized crime.

According to El Tiempo, the arrangement was uncovered after a joint investigation by the FBI and Colombia's police intelligence unit (Dijin) in which 17 kilos of cocaine were intercepted at sea en route to New York. The operation also saw the arrest of alleged representatives of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and National Liberation Army (ELN) in the Caribbean coastal city of Cartagena.

According to an unnamed Dijin officer cited by El Tiempo, the FARC representative, alias "Frank," and ELN counterpart, alias "Mellizo," engaged in months-long negotiations with a Russian Mafia envoy, which established an agreement to swap guns for drugs at a rate of one rifle per kilo of cocaine.

https://reportingproject.net/occrp/index...o-russian-mafia