Yair Klein, an Israeli mercenary convicted in Colombia for training the Medellin cartel and right-wing paramilitaries, threatens to blow the whistle on Colombian officials if that country continues to seek his extradition.
Klein said so to the Jerusalem Post after he returned to Israel after having spent three years in jail in Russia, where he was arrested over an international arrest warrant issued at Colombia’s request.
According to Klein, his operations in Colombia were approved by both the Israeli and Colombian governments, and he even was asked to train left-wing FARC guerrillas by conspiring government officials.
“What I have on these officials is fantastic,” he told the Jersualem Post.
In what the Israeli newspaper called an effort to persuade Colombia not to seek extradition, Klein’s defense attorney said that “my client has information that could cause political shockwaves in the senior echelons of the current and previous Colombian governments. If exposed, the information could lead to dismissals in the government and the arrest of past and present political and military figures. I recommended to my client not to publish the information so as not to cause chaos, because Colombia is now significantly improving the state of human rights in the country.”
Klein was convicted by a Colombian court for the training of groups that later went on to kill tens of thousands of Colombians. His extradition was denied by the European Court for Human Rights.
