Diary from Kazakhstan: Some job, something with killing

At the beginning of October, videos suddenly began circulating in Kazakhstan showing several men in military uniforms sitting in a shelter, presumably on Ukrainian territory. They are sending a call for help to the Kazakh government. The men report that they traveled to Russia to work. They would never have wanted to take part in a war effort.

The men report that they were promised jobs at security companies, in meat processing plants and poultry factories. Instead, they were tricked into signing military contracts by exploiting their lack of knowledge of Russian. They didn't understand what they were committing to. Now they are asking the Kazakh authorities to allow their return. They were afraid of dying at the front.

According to the men, their group originally consisted of 15 Kazakhstanis. At the time the video was recorded, only nine of them were still together as a group. The remaining six have already been sent to combat areas. Reports later emerged about a total of 21 Kazakh citizens who were said to be in a comparable situation. The descriptions of those affected cannot yet be independently verified.

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In the fifth year of Russia's major attack on Ukraine, this is not the first report of people from Central Asia who originally traveled to Russia for jobs and were subsequently used in the war. Citizens of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have also made similar allegations in the past. Those affected reported deception, threats and violence. In addition, some stated that they had signed contracts in Russian even though they did not speak the language sufficiently. The extent to which such practices were actually used cannot be reliably determined.

According to estimates by the Ukrainian program “I Want to Live,” almost 13,000 people from Central Asian countries have so far participated or are continuing to participate on the Russian side in the war against Ukraine. Of these, 2,389 are said to be Kazakh citizens. Not only can the numbers not be verified, they also say nothing about how many of those affected went to war voluntarily and how many may have been pressured or deceived.

What is remarkable about the current case is not only the number of those allegedly affected, but also the reaction of the Kazakh authorities. Unlike previous reports about the involvement of Kazakh citizens in the war, this time the Foreign Ministry got involved. It announced that it would investigate the allegations and began talks with the Russian side.

About a week later it became known that nine Kazakhstanis were said to have been taken out of the combat zone with the involvement of the Foreign Ministry. They are now in Voronezh, Russia. It is unclear when they will be able to return to Kazakhstan. There is currently no reliable information about the fate of the twelve other men.

Even returning to their homeland would not necessarily mean the end of their problems for those affected. In Kazakhstan, mercenary activity and participation in hostilities in other countries are punishable. In recent years, Kazakh citizens who fought on the Russian side have repeatedly been sentenced to up to five years in prison upon their return.

The crucial question remains whether people who came to Russia to make a living were sent to war without their informed consent.

Nikita Danilin, born in 1996, is a journalist from Almaty (Kazakhstan). He was a participant in an Eastern Europe workshop organized by the taz panter foundation.

Donations to the taz panter foundation provide financial support to independent and critical journalists on site and in exile as part of the “Diary of War and Peace” project.