In recent months, Russia has lured dozens, perhaps hundreds, of men from Cameroon, Senegal, Zimbabwe, Bangladesh and other countries into non-existent jobs, who later became the infantry to replenish the depleted invasion forces of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.

As Censor.NET reports, The Telegraph writes about this  .

One of them was 36-year-old Jean Onana from Cameroon. He was promised a job at a shampoo factory in Moscow. Instead, he was arrested, given a one-year contract in the Russian army, and the hell of the Eastern Front.

“I arrived in March. And within a few days I was sent to Rostov and Luhansk for training,” he told Ukrainian investigators. His group included about 10 other foreigners from Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, and Brazil. They were all tricked into joining the war.

Onana miraculously survived the assault – the only one of nine who remained alive after the bunker was shelled. The wounded man lay among the corpses for six days, until he was taken prisoner.

Similarly, 25-year-old Malik Diop from Senegal was lured with promises of washing dishes in Luhansk for $5,700 a month. A week later, he was given a machine gun and sent to the front line.

“We saw a lot of dead bodies in the forest. It was horrible,” he recalls. The guy deserted, but didn’t have time to escape.

Reports on Cameroonian social media say families are losing contact with loved ones who have gone to Russia and disappeared. These posts are often accompanied by photos of the dead in Russian uniforms. One account has already counted 67 Cameroonians dead.

With the gap between Russian propaganda and the reality on the front lines widening, many recruits are finding themselves being used as cannon fodder. According to the CSIS think tank, nearly a million Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded since the invasion began. To make up for those losses, the Kremlin is turning to foreign recruits — including Africans and even 10,000 North Korean soldiers.

The reason is obvious: money. The basic salary of a Cameroonian soldier is 67 pounds sterling per month. Russia promises up to 1,500. “This is why we prefer to die in Russia,” one soldier wrote on social media, showing off his meager salary.

But men are not the only victims of Russian recruitment. A report by the Global Initiative against Transnational Crime says that hundreds of young women from Africa were recruited to work in the Yelabuga Economic Zone to produce Iranian Shahed drones. They were also deceived, promised education and careers, but not told that they would be working at a military facility. In April 2024, a Ukrainian drone attack resulted in casualties among female workers.

Author:  Marina Makeeva Джерело: https://censor.net/ua/n3556842

(c)CENSOR.NET 2025