- Abdujalil Abdurasulov
- BBC News
image source, Getty Images
These men were recruited as part of Russia’s partial mobilization last year.
There are reports that the Russian mercenary group Wagner has recruited tens of thousands of prisoners to fight in Ukraine. But with the increasing number of casualties and extrajudicial executions it makes it much more difficult to find volunteers, even in prisons. Many prisoners now fear being forced to go to war, and those in a particularly vulnerable position are migrant workers from Central Asian countries.
Anwar came to Russia in search of work in 2018. He was later jailed for drug trafficking and sent to serve his sentence in Penal Colony Number Six in the Vladimir region, 190 km from Moscow. The BBC is not revealing his real name or his citizenship for security reasons.
In late January, he told his father that a group of Central Asians had been sent to fight Ukraine without its consent.
“There are many Uzbeks, Tajiks, Kyrgyz in that prison. Now they are planning to send another group and my son is worried that they will force him to go too,” Anwar’s father told the BBC.
The BBC has seen court documents and letters from Anwar confirming that he is indeed serving his sentence in that prison.
And his version about the group that was forced to go to Ukraine in January it is also corroborated by Olga Romanova, director of the civil rights organization Russia Behind Bars. The parents of those prisoners approached her for help.
“They were given no choice. They were told to sign the contract and they were sent to the front like a sack of potatoes,” Romanova said.
image source, Getty Images
Parents of prisoners have approached Olga Romanova for help.
At first, the parents were willing to go to court so that their children would not end up in Ukraine, he says.
But they later refused to do so, fearing the punishment their sons might face if they remained in prison.
Penal Colony Number Six is known for mistreatment and frequent beatings to the convicts.
Olga Romanova describes it as “a prison of torture”. It is where Alexei Navalny, the prominent Russian opponent, is being held.
The colony administration has not responded to the BBC’s request to respond to allegations that prisoners were forced to sign military contracts.
without much success
Prison recruitment seems to have been very successful, but things are changing as Wagner’s group suffer heavy losses on the battlefield.
The BBC Uzbek Service spoke to Farukh (not his real name), a citizen of Uzbekistan who is imprisoned in Russia’s Rostov region, 200km north of Moscow.
Several of his fellow prisoners joined Wagner. They were first sent voluntarily, Farukh said, but now he worries that the prisoners They are forced to go to war.
“At first, I also considered going because everyone thought that Russia was more powerful, that Russia would win, maybe in a month, three months or a year,” he says.
“But now we see how many people are dying there and if they are running out of soldiers, that’s not good. If they tell me to go and I refuse, then they can declare that I am against Russia.”
Central Asian citizens are also being recruited in other ways to fight for Russia, not just in prisons.
In total, there are about 10.5 million immigrants from Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan working in Russia, according to the latest statistics from the Russian Interior Ministry.
And so is a tremendous resource for military recruiters.
image source, Getty Images
Wagner has reportedly recruited tens of thousands of prisoners to fight in the Ukraine.
Russian authorities openly register people for the Armed Forces at the migration center in Moscow,
There are even advertisements in the Uzbek, Kyrgyz and Tajik languages offering citizens of these countries a fast track to obtaining a Russian passport if they join the armed forces.
But activists say It’s not always voluntary.
Migrant rights advocate Valentina Chupik told the BBC that police officers sometimes stop Central Asian migrants on the street and intimidate them into signing a military contract. They are told that otherwise they will be deported, Chupik says.
Many immigrant workers lack proper work permits, live in a different place than where they are registered, or violate other immigration laws.
That’s why they can be an easy target for recruiters.
Aziz (not his real name) who has dual citizenship, Russian and Tajik, told the BBC he was detained during a police raid on the construction site where he works.
They told him that they would take him to a police station to verify his identification, but instead, ended up in a military enlistment office.
When he started yelling at the policemen demanding why they had lied to him, they twisted his arms and pushed him back to the bus.
But many immigrants in Russia are afraid of the security agencies and dare not oppose their enlistment for war.
Remember that you can receive notifications from BBC Mundo. Download the new version of our app and activate them so you don’t miss out on our best content.