Migrants Digging Trenches for Russia in Ukraine Complain of Mistreatment

Migrant workers from Central Asia recruited by Russian companies to dig trenches in occupied parts of Ukraine have reportedly complained about being underpaid.

An investigation project called Sistema, jointly undertaken by Current Time and Radio Free Europe, a United States government-funded outlet, said that the Moscow-based company ABZ Bely Rast had recruited workers from Tajikistan to build trenches in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine in January 2023.

A team of 35 had been tasked with building a one-kilometer-long trench with dugouts around nine miles from the front line, according to the probe published on April 28.

The entire group was offered 800,000 rubles ($11,400) with one worker, a 27-year-old foreman named Nurullo, telling Radio Free Europe that the trenches were "dug by machinery and we worked by hand."

However, after the work was completed, Nurullo said that they were shortchanged by about 200,000 rubles ($2,500) and the company refused to pay them the rest. After stopping the work, those who could not afford to return home remained to await payment and laid a complaint in Moscow.

Nurullo said there were "no police" in Zaporizhzhia, only the military who are "accountable only to themselves." Three workers were arrested and roughed up by the police, threatened with jail terms for their presence on the occupied territories.

The investigation said that in Moscow workers were checked for immigration violations, although none were found. The case was registered with the Russian Interior Ministry and the Moscow prosecutor's office.

Ukrainian human rights activist Pavel Lisyansky told Sistema that digging trenches would be considered a crime because it would be participating in the preparation of the occupation and that such workers that did it could be placed on an international wanted list.

A source in the ABZ Bely Rast's management told the investigation that the money was paid in full, but it was the foreman, who did not pass this on to the workers, although Nurullo denied this.

Newsweek reached out to ABZ Bely Rast via email for comment.

The company mostly deals with road construction and the supply of materials. BBC News Russian reported that the plant also supplied concrete structures for the front in Ukraine to hold back heavy equipment from a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

The Russian Army and occupation authorities have reportedly been preparing the occupied regions for defense since last autumn with satellite images showing trenches from Kherson to Klintsy.

British intelligence said this week that Russia is also building defenses hundreds of miles away from its borders with Ukraine, fearing a counteroffensive so sweeping it could push into Russian territory.

On Monday, the British Ministry of Defence said the presence of trench networks was "well inside internationally recognized Russian territory including in the Belgorod and Kursk regions."