Putin offered to support Venezuela in case of war with Colombia,

During a moment of peak tensions between Colombia and Venezuela, Vladimir Putin told the late Hugo Chávez to count on his support if war broke out, according to a new biography of José Mujica, the popular ex-Uruguayan president who was close to his Venezuelan counterpart. Chávez told Mujica that the Russian president had offered to advise him in the conflict, providing information about Colombia's military arsenal and the types of Russian hardware he could send to counter it, the book claims. Since its publication in May, "Una Oveja Negra al Poder" (A Black Sheep in Power), has created a buzz in Latin America for its purported revelations about Mujica's relationships with Chávez, Brazilian ex-president Luis Ignácio "Lula" da Silva and Cuba's Raúl and Fidel Castro, among other Latin American leftist icons. More…