Trapped in Russia: Harrowing tale of Kenyan forcefully enlisted to fight Ukraine

He was about to lose hope when, from a distance, he saw bodies of dead soldiers scattered in tens.

Still carrying a severely wounded colleague he had started to murmur his last prayers because he couldn’t last another day without water. The thought of getting food couldn’t arise.

The sight of the dead spread across the bloody field tormented him. 

Not sure he would make the paces between bodies as fast as he wanted, he dropped on one knee, still holding onto his half alive comrade.

He took a deep breath tightening his left hand on the comrade as numbness seeped up his injured right hand. He stayed that way some 10 minutes or so and rose again dragging along his colleague.

The weather was warm, because it was August in the Russian occupied lands of Ukraine. Some of the bodies were swollen and beginning to decompose while others were fresh appearing to have been killed a day or so earlier.

He put his colleague down and started combing through the many pockets of military uniforms. On one body he picked some packs of biscuits, on another a bottle of water, on another more water and biscuits.

Stay alive

The stench was stinging his nose but he had gotten used to such extraneous environments because what mattered was to stay alive. It was the ninth day since he took advantage of an act of God to break free from the frontlines.

They had been in their usual operation when a Ukrainian drone took out all the 11 Russian officers leading them into the frontlines in the Ukrainian province of Kharkiv. Realising that their tormentors had been killed he and his fellow survivors resolved to run.

Sitting among the dead bodies holding onto his half alive comrade he gobbled a half litre of water. He then helped his comrade to sip as he tried to bring him back to life.

He eat the biscuits, which was a first meal he had in days. Exhausted and panting, he fell asleep leaning on one of the bodies.

When his eyes fell open he was not sure it was morning, there was a flicker of light across the horizon and he began to move again towards the north.

“In our five days of training” Javan Oketch, not his real name, told The Standard, “we had been told that anytime you find yourself lost and alone, move towards the north.”

To find the north, he said, you base it on the sun’s movements, especially when it is rising or setting.

Struggling with his comrade, who was now conscious, they bumped into another African, a man from Egypt, who was nursing a severe wound in his belly. He had a radio.

Military hospital

The man had worked in Russia before being lured into the army. He could speak Russian. Using the radio they traced their way to a hospital.

At the military hospital, Javan immediately begun looking for contacts of the Kenyan embassy in Moscow.

“I had no passport, no money, it is the Kenyan embassy that saved me from being returned to the frontlines. Three officials of the embassy came to the hospital and for the first time I found somebody to speak to in Kiswahili.”

Speaking at the Standard Group headquarters on Mombasa Road, Nairobi, the 27-year-old returned from the war front with an injured arm and said was lucky to be alive.  He has been visiting Kenyatta National Hospital since his return for therapy sessions as he attempts to heal his hand.

He nearly lost his arm to a drone attack while crossing an active war field shielding himself with dead soldiers over his head and shoulders, but a drone fired from above shattering a dead man into pieces and burning his right arm.

Javan is one of the two returnees that police referred to in their Athi River human trafficking investigations.

“One of the victims who had been trafficked to Russia is currently hospitalised in Kenya and he’s set to undergo surgery.”

Investigating officer Bramwel Saima said in his affidavit against Edward Gituku, the main suspect in the trafficking case.

“They sent us to the war front after five days of training” Javan said.

“ On the frontlines there is no food, no water, no medical attention. When you are injured and cannot walk, you are left to die. ”

Born and raised in Kisumu County, Javan had been looking for a way to get a job in the Middle East but he was promised employment in Russia.

In May in Nairobi he met a man calling himself Gilbert who told him that the Russian government was looking for Kenyans to get them jobs in shopping stores, factories, hotels in Russia.

“Those were the same jobs that I was for looking in Qatar,” Javan said.

Gilbert told him his agency was called Global Space and was located on 11th floor of Chai House. He recruited six individuals from among several applicants, collected their passports, asked them to proceed to a nearby clinic for medical tests.

 The agency paid all fees— visa, medical tests and flights to St Petersburg.

Their visas were ready on July 6 and as they waited for their tickets Gilbert’s team told them they needed to pay Sh30,000 each claiming it was the fee for immigration services. They were directed to a specific immigration officer at the airport on their day of travel.

Javan’s instincts came alive the moment the plane landed in St Petersburg. A man who couldn’t express himself properly in English demanded for their passports, return tickets and their phones.

He then escorted us to a bank where accounts were registered in our names.

“At the bank the man said, ‘here you don’t talk, we command and you do as commanded’ and so we couldn’t ask anything, walitwambia you sign here! Sign here! sign here! Don’t ask any questions.”

The forms that the six of them signed were written in Russian.

Much later Javan realised that he had signed conscription into the Russian army to fight against Ukraine.

He also found out that he had placed a standing order on the bank account that he had opened and that any money paid into that account would be taken by the agency that shipped them to Russia.

After signing documents at the bank they were driven for three hours into a forested area in an abandoned house to spend the night.

The following day they returned to St Petersburg and were introduced to a military unit.

Next of kin

That’s when they received news that they were now soldiers and would now be taken for training.

“They told us that if our agent had not told us, we must know that from now on we were soldiers.’’

I told them I had not been in the military. I had never carried a gun. They said you already signed up and that even if I died me people will get money.”

Javan does not remember indicating in any of the forms who he signed as his next of kin.  

“All the money paid into the account I opened under the watchful eye of the white man in St Petersburg was withdrawn by the agency in Nairobi.

‘‘Sh210,000 was the salary for August, Sh800,000 bonus for service and Sh 3.2 million which was compensation for my injured arm on the frontline.”