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At least 93 Cuban citizens have died fighting in Ukraine as part of the Russian army, according to data extracted from the lists released by the Ukrainian project "I Want to Live", which reports on deceased, captured, or missing Russian military personnel and foreign mercenaries.
The figure -obtained by the independent media elTOQUE after adding the 54 new names revealed on January 27, 2026, to the 39 identified in May 2025- allows for a broader and more heartbreaking profile of the recruitment of poor Cubans for a foreign war, over ten thousand kilometers away from their homeland.
New names, old questions
Among the 54 recently identified deceased are cases previously investigated by elTOQUE, such as the young man Yoan Viondi Mendoza, who died before turning 30. The name of another Cuban is also mentioned, whose family requested to remain anonymous.
In both cases, the families were never officially notified by the Cuban embassy in Moscow or the Russian embassy in Havana. They were also not provided with information about the repatriation of the bodies, nor on how to claim any compensation for the death of their loved ones who were under military contract with Russia.
The Silence of Havana
Since the scandal of recruiting Cubans for the war broke, the government of Miguel Díaz-Canel has chosen silence.
Despite reports of prisoners, wounded individuals, and fatalities, no official information has been released, the existence of these fighters has not been acknowledged, nor has there been any declaration of mourning or information about repatriations.
This contrast is intensified when one recalls that just weeks ago, the Cuban regime declared a national mourning and received with honors the remains of 32 Venezuelan bodyguards who died in the military operation that led to the capture of Nicolás Maduro.
For the Cubans killed by Putin, there are no ceremonies, no plaques, no speeches.
Deceptive contracts and systematic recruitment
The data released by the Ukrainian channel "I Want to Live" reveals troubling patterns: many Cubans signed contracts in 2024, during the height of the conflict, and died just a few months later.
The death dates reveal spikes in casualties on specific days, suggesting that they were used in high-risk assault operations as cannon fodder.
The lists include names, dates of birth, recruitment dates, and the Russian military units in which they served. Some families have identified their relatives through the leaked documents, which are now circulating on Telegram, while others continue to search for answers without state support.
They are not just numbers
The names of the deceased are no longer anonymous figures: the boxer from Villa Clara, Yansiel Morejón Díaz, the resident of Cienfuegos Eduardo Montero Martínez, and the oldest of them all, Reinerio Robles, aged 62, are among the confirmed casualties.
Additionally, elTOQUE points out that the list published by Ukraine is not exhaustive. Some deaths have not been officially confirmed or have been excluded from the record by family decision. The actual total of deceased could be significantly higher.
A tragedy without a voice
While the Cuban regime insists it is not involved in the conflict, more and more Cuban families find themselves trapped in limbo, without news, without bodies, without rights.
The Ukrainian report leaves no room for doubt: Cubans are dying due to the imperial ambitions of Vladimir Putin, with the complicity of the Cuban regime, primarily responsible for the loss of national sovereignty to Moscow, that metropolis to which Fidel Castro submitted in exchange for staying in power.
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