"Stephen Oduor was looking forward to starting his new job as a plumber in Russia to support his family after months of unemployment. But soon after landing in St Petersburg from Nairobi with six other Kenyans one afternoon last August, he started feeling something was off. The man who received them at the airport drove them to a house where their luggage was taken away and they were given black clothes and shoes to wear."
"Afterwards, they were taken to a police station where they were fingerprinted and forced to sign documents written in Russian, a language they did not understand. When they were taken the next day to a large military facility in the city for processing of military IDs, it began to dawn on the 24-year-old that he had unknowingly enlisted in the Russian armed forces."
"Oduor, who eventually managed to escape and returned to Kenya in November, spent three days at the military facility. After getting their IDs, the Kenyans were put on a train and travelled for two days to the city of Belgorod in south-western Russia near the border with Ukraine. At a military camp in the city, they were handed military uniforms, assault rifles and other weapons in order to go straight to the battlefield without training."
More than 200 Kenyans and hundreds of other Africans were trafficked to Russia after being promised ordinary jobs. Many were processed at police stations, fingerprinted, and forced to sign Russian-language documents they could not read. Trafficked individuals received military IDs and were moved to facilities and camps near the Ukraine border. They were issued uniforms, weapons and sent straight to the battlefield without training. Some engaged in tasks like shooting down weaponised drones; others were captured as prisoners of war. A number of those trafficked managed to escape and return to their home countries.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]