A security company led by the former head of operations for the Israeli military made such inroads into Latin America a few years ago that U.S. diplomats saw it as a security risk and moved to thwart the company's expansion, U.S. diplomatic cables show.
The diplomats' efforts were made easier when an interpreter for the Israeli firm, Global CST, was caught peddling classified Colombian Defense Ministry documents to Marxist guerrillas seeking to topple the state, one cable said.
Still, the ability of the Israeli security consultancy to obtain contracts in Colombia, Peru and Panama in rapid succession speaks to the prowess of retired Israeli military officers in peddling security know-how amid perceptions that they'd bring better results than official U.S. government assistance.
At one point, Panama's intelligence chief threatened to rely more heavily on the Israelis out of anger that U.S. officials wouldn't tap the phones of the president's political enemies, according to then cables. U.S. officials countered that such an arrangement would threaten all security cooperation with Panama, and the Panamanians backed down.
Colombia was the first Latin nation to sign a contract with Global CST, doing so in late 2006, according to one cable, the same year its founder, Maj. Gen. Israel Ziv, retired as head of the operations directorate of the Israel Defense Forces.
Ziv "was a personal acquaintance of then-Minister of Defense Juan Manuel Santos," the cable said. Santos is now Colombia's president.
Yemen's Houthi fighters' rapid advance along the Red Sea coast has put them in a prime...
Shortly before taking office, Andy Burnham, the new prime minister, apologised for our party’s initial response...
The UK's new sanctions on illegal Israeli settlements include those in the occupied Golan Heights as...
Relations between Israel and European states have deteriorated after the UK led moves on Tuesday to...
