MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Colombia had no reason to fear Russian bombers in Venezuela, ambassador says

“We did not take any action against Colombia, which could be interpreted as a threat,” said Zaemsky.

Russia’s Ambassador to Caracas Monday said the presence in Venezuela of Tupolev 160 bombers from his country should be no grounds for concern in Colombia as some reports seemed ti have indicated.

 Ambassador Vladimir Zaemsky told a Colombian radio station during an interview that “we are not threatening Colombia.”

“We did not take any action against Colombia, which could be interpreted as a threat,” he added.

The Russian diplomat also explained that he considered “this entire media hype is artificial and unprofessional.”

“This is the third visit of Russian bombers to Venezuela over the past 10 years,” he underlined.

On December 10, two Tupolev Tu-160 strategic bombers, an Antonov An-124 military transport plane and an Ilyushin Il-62 long-range aircraft arrived at the Simon Bolivar International Airport which is both a military and civilian terminal serving the city of Caracas, from where they took part in joint military exercises with Venezuela's Air Force.

“During their visit to Venezuela, the pilots of long-range aircraft performed a routine flight in the airspace over the Caribbean Sea, receiving practical experience of fulfilling the flight task near the Equator in the conditions of high humidity and temperature regimes, as well as of performing joint flights with crews of Venezuela's attack aircraft which accompanied Russian jets at different stages of the route,” a statement from Russia's Defense Ministry said.

All the Russian aircraft involved were back on home soil by the weekend after an in-flight refuelling journey, Russian military sources reported.