The Jerusalem Post

Ex-IDF officer said to have trained gunmen set to return

November 9--Former Lt.-Col. Yair Gal Klein is set to be released from a Russian prison after Colombian attempts to extradite him failed, lawyer tells the 'Post.'

9 de noviembre de 2010

A former IDF lieutenant-colonel held in Russia for nearly three years on charges of training paramilitary gunmen in Colombia will be released to Israel in the coming weeks, The Jerusalem Post learned on Monday.

Yair Gal Klein, 67, was convicted in absentia by a Colombian court in 2001 for training right-wing paramilitary groups and drug cartel gunmen in the 1980s and 1990s, through his firm Spearhead Ltd. The former IDF special forces commander was later arrested in Moscow in April 2007 after Interpol issued an arrest warrant for him and two alleged accomplices.
 
n October, authorities in Russia decided they would adopt recommendations made by the European Court of Human Rights in May 2010 to refuse extradition to Colombia and instead deport him to Israel, Klein’s lawyer Mordechai Tzivin said Monday.

Russian authorities had originally requested the right to appeal the ECHR’s ruling against Klein’s extradition, but lost the appeal.

 
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