The Kremlin’s interference in Colombia’s presidential election

Quite alarmingly, Colombian intelligence, in conjunction with Five Eyes and NATO intelligence services, released a report in February detailing the disinformation campaign taken up by the Russian government to interfere in the Colombian 2022 presidential election. The report alleges that Russia promoted disinformation for the March legislative, and upcoming May 29 elections.

Colombian intelligence had been warned prior by U.S intelligence, including by Juan González, Director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council in the White House. Russia, according to the report, is attempting to influence electoral outcomes to diminish public trust in democracy and to install their preferred candidate.

This is neither the first time – nor the last – that the Kremlin has attempted to influence the results of a Colombian election. In 2018, then-US Under-Secretary of Defense for the Western Hemisphere Frank Moro affirmed that Russia had interfered with the election in favour of Gustavo Petro’s candidacy.

Russia has a vested interest in sowing discord within Colombia, one of the strongest democracies in the Western hemisphere and a country with a deep security partnership with the United States, Canada, and NATO.

To illustrate, Colombia was recently made a major security partner of the United States and a NATO partner — the only country with such a designation in the region. The Kremlin hopes to fragment Colombian society and democracy further, hurting Colombians’ faith in their public, democratic institutions.

Russia, itself an autocracy ruled by kleptocrats and the security state, does not want to promote democracy, but rather hinder its success throughout the world. Russia has been behind anti-democracy information warfare campaigns in various other countries, including the United States, Canada, and Brazil, among many others.

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