How is Russia recruiting foreigners for war in Ukraine

Russia recruits citizens from the global south to the fight against Ukraine. It's not just a relatively good salary, that I seduce them.

According to a DW script, 21-year-old Sri Lanka did not expect to be taken to the front line in Ukraine when it signed the contract with the Russian Defence Ministry.

For the possibility of joining the Russian Army, he had heard from a co-ordinator from Sri Lanka.

He had told him that if he served for a year in the army, he and his parents would receive Russian citizenship.

He told me you're not sent to the front, but he only serves as a assistant”, says the young man.

So in February he decided to sign a contract quickly and immediately received about $2000.

He was promised a monthly salary of $2,300 plus some additional benefits.

The city's son from Walasmula says he has been forced to sign a contract with the army to gain legal status in Russia.

In the spring while he was in a Ukrainian hospital near the front, after being wounded and taken captive, he agreed to tell his story on condition of anonymity.

He spoke to a Sinhalese-language DW journalist, through a telephone translator, under surveillance by Ukrainian military officers, who apparently did not have enough English knowledge and did not intervene.

From the slaughter to the restaurant and then to the military

Because of the poor economic situation in Sri Lanka”, says the youth, he decided to obtain a working visa in Russia through an employment agency.

The crisis in his country has also been aggravated by Russia's war, as food and fuel prices have been raised by the Ukrainian Black Sea export blockade.

The man worked a year at a slaughterhouse in Russia, and when his visa was over, he lived another year illegally in Moscow, where he worked on a fast food floor. Eventually he joined the Russian army.

After just two months of inland service, he moved to the outskirts of the occupied Ukrainian city of Donjeck.

“I told the commander that I wanted to return to Sri Lanka, but he said it was impossible and that under the contract I would face 15 years in Russia, if I fled”, the young man says, adding that there were also citizens in his unit from Nepal, India, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

He had only been on the front once for five days. He was injured there and captured.

Russia forces migrants and foreign students to join military

As Bloomberg news agency reported in June, citing European officials, Russia has forced thousands of foreign immigrant workers and students to join the Russian Army in the fight against Ukraine.

If they refused, foreigners threatened that they would no longer be extended visas in Russia.

“We are very, very poor”, says a 35-year-old nepale in a war prisoner camp in western Ukraine. He told his story to DW in July and didn't want his name mentioned. A guard was present in this conversation, but he kept quiet and seemed to understand no English.

In Nepal the man had worked as a taxi driver with a payment of about $400 a month. This did not work to support his wife, two children, and his parents.

From some friends from India he learned that in the Russian army, you can win “a lot before”.

So he went to Moscow in October 2023, where he was examined and sent to the training center “Avantgard” on the outskirts of the Russian capital along with 60 other foreigners.

Other foreigners recruited have reported this object.

According to American broadcaster CNN, he only serves foreign mercenaries training.

There Nepali signed an annual contract with the Russian Army for a $2000 monthly salary.

It shows that he too was originally placed inside Russia, along with a Chinese assistant cook.

In his unit were 23 people from Nepal and three from India. Eleven others were Russians. Everyone communicated with each other with the help of the audio translation systems.

A month later he moved to positions near Donjeck. There he begged the commander to let him go home, but he too was told that the interruption of the contract was not possible.

A few weeks later, in April, he was injured and without Ukrainian soldiers. I pulled my helmet, my vest and my gun, I asked for help, and I told them I came from Nepal”, he relates.

People from Global South to Military Service for Russia

Currently there are about ten mercenaries captured by Ukrainians, says Petro Jacenko, spokesperson for the co-ordination staff for war prisoners in the Ukrainian military intelligence service HUR.

Several others have been caught, but still have not been included in statistics”, says Jacques for DW.

According to him, there are citizens from African countries, such as Sierra Leone and Somalia, but also Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Cuba.

The “are mostly people from the global south, from poor countries”, says Jacenko, adding that a Cuban has told him that he won only seven dollars a month in his country.

HOUR has no knowledge of how many foreigners fight on the Russian side.

However, Russia lures foreigners with social media advertising, as well as directly by means of officials abroad, says Yacenko: “these are often promised jobs at various firms, and, when it comes to the military, they tell them that you will be deployed only inside”.

However, Petro Yacenko from HUR stresses that among foreigners there are also professionals who fight for Russia. “They have military experience and they know very well where they're going”, Yacenko says.

Not all are victims of fraud.

Foreign mercenaries classified as prisoners of war

“As long as there is no trial against them, they are regarded as captured Russian soldiers”, says Yacenko regarding the status of these foreigners.

None of them have yet been released through exchange or other procedures.

Some places, especially Sri Lanka and Nepal, are interested in taking their citizens. This enables us to negotiate”, says the HUR spokesman.

Foreigners Also Offered Help to Leave the Army

Also well known are the cases when foreigners have fled from Russian positions. In May HUR reported, without providing any figures, for a massive escape from Nepal's mercenaries, who were stationed in the occupied Luhansk region.

And in June, France 24 station reported 22 Srianques, who had fled from the Russian army.

Activists of the Russian human rights organisation “But they also care for citizens of other countries.

Ivan Chuvilyaev, representative of the organisation, confirmed in an interview for DW, that activists had also been able to help citizens from African countries and Afghanistan to escape. According to him, the way Russia recruits foreigners to the military is not different from recruiting its citizens.

The fact that people do not know the law and are in an uncertain financial situation” is beneficial, says human rights activist. /DW/