Russia recruits Yemenis for the war in Ukraine — they are tricked into Russia and forced to sign contracts that they cannot read

Russia has recruited hundreds of Yemenis to participate in hostilities in Ukraine. They were brought as a result of a shadowy human trafficking operation.

The Financial Times (FT) writes about it.

Yemeni recruits who came to Russia told FT they were promised high-paying jobs and even Russian citizenship. When they arrived with the help of a Houthi-linked company, they were forcibly recruited into the Russian army and sent to the front line in Ukraine.

Contracts signed by Yemenis seen by FT include a company founded by Abdulwali Abdo Hassan al-Jabri, a prominent Houthi politician. Incorporated in Salalah, Oman, Al Jabri is identified in its registration documents as a tour operator and retail supplier of medical equipment and pharmaceuticals.

The recruitment of Yemeni soldiers appears to have started as early as July. One of the contracts that the journalists got acquainted with was dated July 3 and signed by the head of the contractor selection center in Nizhny Novgorod.

One of the recruits, named Nabil, said he was part of a group of about 200 Yemenis drafted into the Russian army in September after arriving in Moscow. Although some of them were experienced fighters, many others had no military training. According to him, they were lured to Russia by deception and forced to sign service contracts that they could not read.

Nabil said he was lured by promises of lucrative jobs in fields such as "security" and "engineering," hoping to earn enough money to complete his studies.

Abdullah, another Yemeni man who asked that his real name not be published, said he was promised a $10 000 bonus and another $2 000 a month, as well as possibly Russian citizenship, for working in Russia to manufacture drones.

He arrived in Moscow on September 18. According to the man, his group was forcibly taken from the airport to a facility five hours away from Moscow, where a man who spoke simple Arabic fired a gun over their heads when they refused to sign a service contract written in Russian.

According to Abdullah, many of the first group of arrivals died in Ukraine because they were taken to the war by "swindlers who traffic in people".

• Currently, there are established facts of recruitment of citizens of Nepal, India, Syria, Serbia, Sri Lanka and Somalia into the Russian army. The Russian Federation also recruited illegal migrants to its army from the Finnish border who tried to get to the EU through Russia. As for the citizens of Nepal and India, some of them are already in captivity or have died. There are already videos on social networks with Africans as part of the occupation forces of the Russian Federation in Ukraine.
• In addition, as Bloomberg writes, Russia forced thousands of migrants and foreign students to fight against Ukraine, threatening not to extend their visas. Some of them are used as additional force for the offensive in the Kharkiv region.
• And in October 2024, the first soldiers from the DPRK arrived at the front — they were recorded in the Kursk region.

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