Colombia's army has faced the problem of not being able to pay for repairs to its Mi-17 family helicopters under a contract with National Aviation Service Company SA.
Previously concluded agreements had to be suspended, as this contractor cannot receive payments due to Western sanctions against the russian federation. More specifically, this company was blocked from using the Swift payment system and was included in the so-called "Clinton list," Infodefensa reports citing DAVAA, the air force of the National Army of Colombia.
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As noted, Colombia currently has about 20 helicopters of the Mi-17 type, only nine of them are currently in flight-capable condition, another nine are under conservation, and the other two are damaged and waiting for their time to be dismantled for spare parts.
Between 1996 and 2009, Colombia received a total of 26 Mi-17 in various modifications helicopters from the russian federation. For now, the Colombian military expects the rotorcraft still in service will be able to last until 2026–2027.
There are at least two interesting nuances about this predicament. One is that back in winter 2023, the United States offered multiple nations, including Colombia, to hand their Soviet- and russian-made helicopters over to the Armed Forces of Ukraine in exchange for appropriate compensation. But Colombia, like other Latin American countries, refused the offer. And now the Colombian military is trying to figure out how to maintain these rotorcraft at all.
Another interesting point is about how it happened that the above-mentioned contractor, tasked to repair the Colombian Mi-17s, ended up under sanctions targeted against russia. The hypothesis is that representatives of the russian defense industry disguised themselves as various legal entities in Colombia in order to maintain a presence in "their" spheres of influence in the world arms market. However, this is still only a speculation, which are yet to be confirmed or refuted.
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