Copyright kyivpost
Kenya’s Foreign Ministry on Monday announced in a statement that its citizens are still being “lured” by Kremlin recruiters into fighting in Ukraine, many of whom have ended up detained in military camps across Russia, the foreign minister, Musalia Mudavadi, said. A month ago, Nairobi officials raised the red flag that Moscow was taking advantage of poor Africans to fight in a war by signing contracts they didn’t understand. Officials arrested a Russian diplomat for carrying out just such conscriptions. Mudavadi and his department did not offer any numbers of Kenyan recruits, nor how many had been detained or hurt, but noted that it has been petitioning Moscow in a “crucial meeting” to help secure their release and repatriation. The Ministry specified that Kenyans are being “lured by... corrupt and ruthless agents to travel to Russia and unknowingly find themselves in the Russian military operation. “The system has been made complicated by the agents who masquerade as working with the Russian Government and use unscrupulous methods including falsified information to lure innocent Kenyans into the battlefield,” it added. Russia has been repeatedly accused of deceiving citizens from poor countries into signing contracts with its military, AFP noted. These contracts are written in Russian, which, the ministry insisted, the Kenyans signing them do not understand. Local media in Kenya have reported that Russian recruitment networks are targeting poor young men, of which there are many in the East African nation. Many of them later claimed they were tricked or pressured into fighting once they arrived. In September, Kenyan authorities detained a Russian embassy employee accused of recruiting local men as mercenaries for Moscow’s war in Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian project “I Want to Live” [Хочу жить], a Kyiv-backed initiative facilitating the surrender of Russian and Belarusian troops. The group said that police in Nairobi arrested Mikhail Lyapin, a Russian working under diplomatic cover, who allegedly played a key role in persuading Kenyan nationals to travel abroad with promises of lucrative jobs. Once in Russia, recruits were reportedly pressured into signing contracts with the Russian military and deployed to the front lines in Ukraine. Police also arrested Edward Kamau Gitaku, a Kenyan described as a coordinator who helped funnel recruits toward the Russian armed forces. Investigators are now questioning at least 21 Kenyans believed to have been recruited. The foreign ministry on Monday said Kenya was still committed to signing a labor agreement with Moscow aimed at giving Kenyans access to “genuine job opportunities in Russia.”
