Russia actively recruits Syrian citizens, promising them Russian passports and paid work, but later they are sent to the front.
Points of attention
- Russia recruits Syrians, promising them Russian passports and paid work, after which they send them to the front in Ukraine.
- With the help of travel companies, the Russian Federation attracts new mercenaries to participate in "meat assaults" in the east of Ukraine.
- Syrians are just one of the groups of naive citizens that Russia is recruiting to wage war against Ukraine, using various methods and promises.
- Ukrainian defense forces have already arrested mercenaries from Nepal and Somalia, thus exposing the plans of the Russian Federation to attract foreign fighters.
Syrian mercenaries recruited by the Russian Federation disappear in the Luhansk region
As reported in GUR, Syrian mercenaries are sent to the front line, where they suffer significant losses.
In July 2024, in particular, 14 Syrian mercenaries, including Mohammed Mansour, were sent to storm positions near the city of Svatove in the Luhansk region. During the Ukrainian shelling, most of them died, and the Russian military refused to evacuate the wounded. Mansur fled the battlefield, and his squad was declared missing.
Recently, the Syrian media reported the death of another mercenary, Wahid Mursal Al-Shibli, who received a Russian passport and fought in Luhansk region.
His squad of seven Syrians was destroyed and Mursal died due to lack of evacuation. The fate of other militants is unknown.
Russia uses travel companies to recruit Syrians for the war against Ukraine. First, they are offered jobs as security guards in Russian oil regions, and then they are tempted by a higher salary to participate in "meat assaults," the GUR noted.
Russia recruits mercenaries in various countries
In the summer of 2023, it became known that residents of Nepal, who came to the Russian Federation to study, were being recruited for the war against Ukraine. The main argument for making such a decision is money.
In December, Nepal issued an official statement calling on Moscow to stop recruiting its citizens for the war and to return the bodies of those who had already died.
A mercenary of the Russian army from Somalia, Muhammad Adil, was captured by the Armed Forces of Ukraine at the beginning of January 2024. Online.ua journalists managed to ask the captured foreigner why he came to Russia, how he got into the occupier's army, how much he trained before he got to the front line, and which of his decisions he regrets.
After arriving in the Russian Federation, he got a job at a factory, but soon saw an advertisement of the Russian army on the street and signed a contract on December 3, 2023.
In less than a month, already on January 4, 2024, he found himself on the front line on the territory of Ukraine.
