Heavy battlefield losses in Ukraine push Russia to seek foreign recruits
Independent media reports also indicate that at least 100 citizens of Central Asian states have been killed since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine. Others, including Kenyans, have been forced to seek medical help after returning home with injuries.
Russia has lost around 1,113,430 troops in Ukraine since the beginning of its full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, the General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces reported on Friday.
The number includes 970 casualties that Russian forces suffered over the past day.
According to the report, Russia has also lost 11,225 tanks, 23,297 armoured fighting vehicles, 63,325 vehicles and fuel tanks, 33,413 artillery systems, 1,514 multiple launch rocket systems, 1,222 air defence systems, 427 aeroplanes, 346 helicopters, 66,093 drones, 28 ships and boats, and one submarine in the war.
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This explains the country's increasing need to replenish human losses on the war front, according to multiple reports.
According to the Centre for Eastern Studies, in an attempt to identify additional mobilisation potential to minimise the participation of Russians in the bloody fighting in Ukraine, the Kremlin and its top military officials have considered several solutions, including a plan to conscript citizens of other countries into the Russian army.
"These include economic migrants hailing from the former Soviet republics who reside in the Russian Federation, as well as residents of other countries who would agree to come to Russia for this purpose," the centre says in an earlier report.
Kenyans have been part of the nationalities that have found themselves fighting for Russia on the frontlines, the majority having moved to Moscow, unaware of the job that they would eventually be forced to take.
The recruitment, according to the centre, has, however, been ongoing for over two years.
Evans, who has spent over a decade in athletics, went to Russia as a tourist, only to be deceived into joining the Russian military and later captured by Ukrainian forces. (screengrab)
In April last year, the UK Ministry of Defence reported that Russia had recruited more than 1,500 foreign nationals to fight against Ukraine between April 2023 and May 2024.
According to the British intelligence update, the majority of foreign recruits came from South and East Asia, accounting for 771 individuals.
They were followed by citizens from former Soviet republics (523) and African countries (72).
The update suggested that the main factors motivating foreigners to sign military contracts are financial incentives and the possibility of obtaining Russian citizenship.
"Many foreign citizens are almost certainly recruited specifically through Moscow due to higher signing bonuses and the city's relative international accessibility," it said.
As reported by the Kenyans who had been enlisted but managed to return home, who have mostly shared bad experiences of their involvement in the war, a report by the BBC Russian Service established that by the end of December 2023, at least 254 foreigners who served in the ranks of the Russian army had been killed.
Independent media reports also indicate that at least 100 citizens of Central Asian states have been killed since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine.
Others, including Kenyans, have been forced to seek medical help after returning home with injuries. The number of foreigners involved in the war is, however, yet to be determined.
"At the same time, however, it is impossible to determine even an approximate number of foreigners fighting for the Kremlin. Foreign nationals have served both in mercenary groups (mainly in the Wagner Group before its dissolution) and in regular units of the Russian Armed Forces," the centre adds.
A tank proceeds along a road near Mariupol on April 17, 2022. (Photo: Victor/Xinhua)
However, it estimates that foreigners fighting for Russia, who are estimated to run into thousands, include citizens of Cuba, Nepal, Syria, Serbia, Afghanistan, Somalia, and Malaysia.
Their recruitment methods vary from deceitful means, while some other states have allowed the enlistment as long as it's conducted 'legally'.
Cuba has since distanced itself from the recruitment groups involved in ferrying its nationals to Russia, but its ambassador to Moscow stated that Havana did not object to the participation of Cuban nationals in the war in Ukraine as long as it is "legal".
On its part, the government of Nepal has prohibited its citizens from seeking employment in Russia and Ukraine, and requested Moscow to send the conscripted Nepalese nationals and the bodies of those killed back to Nepal.
Those enlisted from some other states, like Syria and Afghanistan, include ex-military officials, including former soldiers of Afghan security forces who left Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover.
"The Somali citizens who have been forcibly enlisted into the Russian army (there are at least eight such individuals) are an element of a bigger group which was arrested for violating passport regulations (these people attempted to enter the European Union from Belarus and Russia, the countries which have been putting migration pressure on the EU borders). Moscow has also conscripted foreigners who were serving sentences in Russian prisons; this is how individual citizens of Tanzania, the Ivory Coast, and Zambia were incorporated into the Wagner Group," the centre says.
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