Venezuela soldiers choose desertion
CUCUTA, Colombia — The simple house on a street ridden with potholes in this town on Colombia’s restive border with Venezuela has become a refuge for the newly homeless: 40 Venezuelan soldiers who abandoned their posts and ran for their lives.
The young National Guard troops sleep on thin mats on the floor. In one room, several flak jackets rest along a wall. On a balcony, boots that got wet crossing the muddy Tachira River are set out to dry.
“I was tired of people seeing me as just one more of them,” Sgt. Jorge Torres said, referring to President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist government. “I’m not.”
A high-stakes plan by the Venezuelan opposition to bring humanitarian aid into the country floundered Saturday when troops loyal to Maduro refused to let the trucks carrying food and medical supplies cross, but it did set off a wave of military defections unlike any seen yet amid the country’s mounting crisis. Over 320 mostly low-ranking soldiers fled in a span of four days, Colombian immigration officials said Tuesday.
With no relatives in Colombia, several dozen have ended up in a shelter run by a priest. The home on a street with low-hanging electrical wires is where they are nervously keeping track of relatives left behind, figuring out how to apply for asylum and deciding what should come next.
“The only way for this government to leave, unfortunately, and all of Venezuela knows it, is for there to be a direct intervention,” said Sgt. Jose Gomez, a father of two. “The only one with that power is the international community.”
In interviews with The Associated Press, nine National Guard soldiers described the day that they were ordered by commanders to stop the humanitarian aid from entering Venezuela. Fearful of being jailed, many complied with orders and admitted to launching tear gas at protesters. Two said they were part of a failed plot to get the aid in. All fled after making unplanned, split-second decisions with only the uniform on their backs.
“Son, if this decision is to save your life and so that there is change, do it,” Gomez said his father told him in a brief phone call before he sprinted across the border.
The defections come as the Venezuelan opposition puts pressure on the military to recognize congress leader Juan Guaido as the nation’s rightful president. Venezuela’s military has served as the traditional arbiter of political disputes, forcing out dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez in 1958. But the top military brass has stood fast with Maduro, who has shown no sign that he intends to relinquish power.