The attorney general says Vagin came to Colombia in 2017 on a tourist visa, and never left. Instead he ran a criminal organization that convinced locals to rent their personal data to him to create accounts with virtual bookies and Colombian banks. Then Vagin’s collaborators in Europe would wire money into these rented accounts to make fraudulent bets on various sporting events, as directed by collaborators in Russia.

Of those arrested, Giovanna Edilma Gutiérrez Gómez, Mauricio García-Herreros Borda and Ana María Gutiérrez Gómez have already admitted their crimes, while Vagin, Gina Paola García-Herreros Borda, Cristian Leonardo Reyes Muñoz and Jorge Antonio Casas León are fighting the charges. All are in prison except for Ana María Gutiérrez Gomez, who is under house arrest.

Estas personas, capturadas por el #CTI, con apoyo de @COL_EJERCITO, fueron imputadas como presuntas responsables de los delitos de: concierto para delinquir agravado, transferencia no consentida de activos en modalidad masa, y acceso abusivo a sistemas informáticos. pic.twitter.com/WQvDJp1IKi

— Fiscalía Colombia (@FiscaliaCol) April 8, 2022

Now, an investigation by Colombia’s attorney general shows the situation is much worse than a Russian “illegal” (Sergei Vagin) paying off street thugs and vandals. According to documents leaked to Blu Radio by the Colombian attorney general’s office, an internal counterintelligence investigation has identified a Russian Colonel, credentialed as a senior joint naval and air military attaché affiliated with the “Russian Intelligence And Counterintelligence department of General Command J2,” (further referred to as “J2”) who sought to compromise Colombian Colonel Armando Rodríguez Jiménez by paying him an apartment and 200 million pesos (approximately $54,000 USD) in exchange for becoming a Russian agent and passing on Colombian, US and NATO secrets.

“The Born Identity?” — Colombian CTI documents identify “J2” as Russian Colonel Vladimir Born, appointed military attaché in 2018

“In our territory, all diplomats who come to strengthen ties are welcome, but we will also be clear, relentless and forceful with those who intend, in the exercise of diplomatic functions, to come to our country to try to interfere in the healthy development of our Colombian institutions,” said Colombian President Ivan Duque when asked last year about emerging Russian espionage allegations.

Colombia holds several military industrial events, usually every two years. F-AIR is held in Rionegro and focuses on military and civilian aviation.  Colombiamar focuses on the naval sector, and the biggest event, Expodefensa is Colombia’s biggest military expo. The last one, held in 2021 saw 228 exhibitors from 25 countries, and 62 foreign delegations from 24 different countries. Customarily, the military attachés from the Russian Embassy (pictured above) would receive invitations.

In 2019, Colonel Rodriguez was responsible for coordinating the attendance of foreign military attachés assigned to Colombia, including J2. They originally met that year at Bogotá’s Corferias convention and meeting center, but then had lunch almost a year later at a British themed restaurant called “London Calling,” facing Bogotá’s “Parque 93,” the capital city’s epicenter of expatriate residential and social life.

According to the testimony provided by Colonel Rodriguez to Colombian counterintelligence prosecutors, after small talk about personal and family life, J2 got down to business, and began by asking for details on US military activities.

J2: “Are there US troops here?”

Rodriguez: “No, not in Colombia, there can’t be armed troops, they can’t even be in transit.”

J2: “So what are they doing here?”

Rodriguez: “The gringos only give us training and instruction.”

J2: “What about the British?”

Rodriguez: “Well, it’s also Israel because they give us communications elements, and training.”

J2: “And NATO?”

Rodriguez: “No, well we are with NATO but NATO does not offer us anything, it’s about what we can offer them.”

The two went on to discuss the Russian’s career, with the J2 telling Rodriguez he comes from a military family and had served in Afghanistan and Chechnya, where he also had family ties. J2 said his wife and children were also stationed in Colombia with him. Rodriguez was curious about any tourism J2 had enjoyed in Colombia, but J2 was fixated on the Americans.

J2: “You know what they plan to give to the gringos or buy from them or give to you. You gave me to understand that there were some Russian companies that wanted to submit offers.” (Compete for contracts with the Colombian military).

According to testimony by Rodriguez, J2 then asked that he share documents on capabilities, but Rodriguez declined, saying he was focused on doctrine, not capabilities. J2 then became more blunt.

J2: “It’s that you can win, I win and you can win, it is simply to see what we can offer.”

The Venezuelan Connection

Rodriguez says J2 then asked about the possibility of Colombia invading Venezuela, to which Rodriguez said no, they were sister countries.

According to the prosecutor’s report, J2 participated in a May 2018 meeting in Moscow with Russian cyberwarfare personnel and officers of the FSB (Russian intelligence successor to the KGB) to hatch “Operation Sebastián,” a $37 million dollar plan to develop Venezuelan cyber operations, including hardware, software, and cyberdefenses, financed between a joint Chinese – Venezuelan fund.

Blue Radio indicates that J2 would direct participation in Operation Sebastián through ROSTEC, the representative in Colombia of the Russian entity ROSOBORONEXPORT, sanctioned by the US government since 2015 for violating INKSNA: The Iran, North Korea and Syria Nonproliferation Act. According to the attorney general’s office, Sebastián coordinates Russian espionage activities in Colombia and the activities of Russian soldiers and mercenaries currently operating in Venezuela.

Such operations would include at least four Russian signals intelligence posts established in Venezuela, by Russia, according to the Colombian government, to eavesdrop on Colombian communications and traffic.

In addition to Vagin, charges were filed against:

• Mauricio Garcia (former CTI Colombian government investigative agent)
• Giovanna Edilma Gutierrez
• Ana Maria Gutierrez
• Gina Paola Garcia
• Jorge Antonio
• Cristian Leandro Reyes

Colombia’s attorney general says Mauricio Garcia and the Gutierrez sisters have already accepted the charges against them.

The latest scandal erupts after Colombia expelled Russian spies Alexander Paristov and Alexander Nikolayevich Belousov in December of 2020 for recruiting agents and gathering information on Colombian natural resources, military capabilities, and the energy grid. Belousov was fingered as part of the notorious GRU, or Russian military intelligence, and Paristov was linked to the SVR, successor to Vladimir Putin’s own KGB.

Colombia’s then foreign minister speaking on the 2020 Russian spy exposure:

La Canciller Claudia Blum informa que el Gobierno Nacional tomó la decisión de solicitar el retiro de dos funcionarios diplomáticos rusos acreditados en Colombia. Más información aquí: https://t.co/2QeVDOuEdI pic.twitter.com/m2BfO9E4vK

— Cancillería Colombia (@CancilleriaCol) December 22, 2020

Operations carried out by Colombian counterintelligence investigators, supported by US signals intelligence have managed to record and document the activities of Vagin and a larger network of Russian operatives. Investigative reporting by Colombian daily El Tiempo reveals a vast operation pouring Russian money into Colombia with the objective of discrediting the government and destabilizing public order, in part, by funding much of the riots and civil unrest the country has experienced in the past three years.

Alias Servac

While Sergei Vagin would be an “illegal,” or a spy working outside of diplomatic cover, El Tiempo fingers “alias Servac” as a Russian spymaster operating under diplomatic accreditation. Wire intercepts, according to El Tiempo, implicate Servac in coordinating wire transfers from Russia’s Sberbank to Colombia through Western Union, then filming evidence of the riots they supposedly funded, and reporting back to a “Dimas” (Diminutive of Dimitry) in Moscow.

“We confirm that they are renting accounts, money is coming in via ‘smurfing’ just as drug traffickers,” said Colombian Vice President and Foreign Minister Marta Lucia Ramirez. Smurfing is when large amounts of money are distributed across many small, unrelated accounts to disguise the source and destination of funds.

Just an innocent criminal

On Thursday, Sergei Vagin’s lawyer Francisco Gonzalez told Blu Radio that Vagin isn’t involved in financing protests but is a simple international gambling fraudster.

“Someone with a great imagination linked his nationality and the 2019 riots to ‘smurfing,’ which is appointing people to make and receive money orders from one place to another,” said Gonzalez, explaining Vagin’s innocent virtues. “People open accounts, register and enter bets fraudulently and earn a lot of money. The chance of loss is less than 10% and they beat the bookmakers.”

When news network RCN released video that Vagin himself took with rioters during civil unrest, Gonzalez called it “pure coincidence.”

En @LaNochentn24 y @NoticiasRCN revelamos pruebas de un dossier de inteligencia que acusa al ruso Sergei Vagin de ser jefe de red que desde Rusia alquila cuentas para traer dinero a Colombia. 4 días después de esta revelación fue capturado. ¿Qué hacía este ruso en las protestas? pic.twitter.com/cqKLrIe84T

— Jefferson Beltrán Neira (@JeffersonNTN24) March 30, 2022

Even if Vagin’s cover were true, he would likely be guilty of felony money laundering, tax evasion, and immigration violations. Colombia’s Information and Financial Analysis Unit accuses Vagin and his network of laundering a mammoth $146 million US dollars’ worth of Russian funds into Colombia since 2018.

Vagin is said to have entered Colombia in 2016 on a tourism visa valid for only 90 days.

Fake News

Russia’s embassy, located in a quiet area of Bogotá’s Chapinero neighborhood, issued a statement denouncing all allegations. “Mr. Vagin, he is a simple analyst who offers his services to a business of sports betting. He has no link at all to the government of Russia or this Embassy. Imagine how much money Colombian contributors would be able to save if they had cleared the suspicions of this Russian citizen across the mechanisms of interstate police action.”

“We are attentive to the detention of the Russian citizen Sergei Vagin on March 30 of 2022 by the Colombian forces of public order. We hope that the competent organs offer impartiality and adherence to the law with regards to this citizen of the Russian Federation.”

#URGENTE || En vista de la continuación de la campaña mediática local premeditada orientada a desacreditar a Rusia y lesionar las relaciones bilaterales con Colombia, la Embajada se ve obligada a comunicar lo siguiente: pic.twitter.com/PlX9jvIyua

— Rusia en Colombia (@RusiaColombia) March 31, 2022

Unsurprisingly, Russia claims it is the innocent victim in all this, publishing: “All this seems a typical example of fake news, when they try to argue the necessary and already predetermined conclusion with crazy and incoherent things. This type of fabrication and ‘leakage to the press’ shows the desire of some media to join the current Western information mainstream characterized by a high degree of Russophobia and a blind fury towards everything linked to Russia.”

Of course, the same government claimed that the imminent invasion of the Ukraine was all a lie and fabricated western hysteria as well.

National Security Implications

Yesterday, Medellín-based daily El Colombiano revealed that it had reviewed hours of recordings of restricted proceedings by Colombia’s attorney general in the case where the dossier of materials gathered were presented to Casa Nariño (Colombia’s Presidential Palace). “The citizen Vladimir, attached to the Russian embassy, ​​​​offered the colonel the sum of $200 million and the delivery of an apartment,” in an attempt to gain access to Colombia’s top secret National Weapons Acquisition Plan.

Defense minister Diego Molano in February accused the Russian military of installing five radar stations in Venezuela near the Colombian border, as relations between Casa Nariño and the Kremilin continued to deteriorate.