(Bloomberg) -- Russia is relying on thousands of often-unwittingly recruited workers from neighboring countries to undertake the sprawling multi-billion-dollar reconstruction in the occupied territories of Ukraine.

Job-seekers coming to Russia from former Soviet Union states are being sent to Ukraine to work on construction projects, but have at times wound up digging trenches and fighting on the battlefield. In the process, they risk running afoul of laws in their homelands that could land them in prison.

President Vladimir Putin has said Russia is spending more than 1 trillion rubles ($11 billion) a year to rebuild occupied territories of Ukraine after his nearly two-year-old invasion left huge areas in ruins. The effort, part of a strategy to solidify control over the illegally annexed regions, requires an influx of workers, but Russia already faces a severe squeeze on its labor force.

Migrants are lured by job postings on Russian websites offering construction work for a salary much higher than the market average. For example, construction work in the eastern Donbas region can promise as much as 350,000 rubles (almost $4,000) a month with accommodation, transportation and health insurance. By contrast, a machine operator in a factory makes up to $2,000 a month, already nearly 20% more than a year earlier, according to data from local recruitment service Superjob, as the competition for employees amid the war has fueled a wage spiral.

Valentina Chupik, a lawyer and the director of the human rights nonprofit organization Tong Jahoni, told Bloomberg News about 50 migrants from her practice went to Ukraine voluntarily, but “the promised salary was not paid, and on the way back to Russia they were not allowed to enter.” Chupik said she also knew many cases of citizens from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan who had been tricked into working for nothing and then forced to dig trenches in combat zones.  

One laborer, a man named Soleh from Tajikistan, said that people attempted to recruit him to fight in Ukraine. “While I was sitting in the deportation center in November, they actively recruited me, and said they would give me citizenship if I signed a contract.” Though he was promised “a lot of money,” he opted to return home, he said.

“They recruit everywhere,” Soleh said. “A friend of mine was forced to sign a contract when he went to the migration center to apply for a residence permit. Those who go to construction sites in the DNR and LNR are persuaded to go fight there,” he said, referring to the occupied areas of Donetsk and Luhansk.

Putin supported separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk regions starting in 2014, and annexed the areas along with parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions as part of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine launched in February 2022. The Kremlin doesn’t fully control any of those regions, and much of the area has suffered heavy damage, and in places complete destruction, being at the center of the war’s heaviest fighting.

Russian officials have said thousands of apartment buildings were restored or built in the occupied territories as well as hundreds of schools, museums, clinics and libraries. Speaking at an event on Jan. 31 about the reconstruction effort, Putin called it a “key priority” and said the occupied regions had in less than two years renovated 2,000 km of roads and about 6,500 residential and other buildings, even if many of them had to be rebuilt from the ground up. He said Russia aimed to incorporate the territories at “national level standards” of living by 2030.

In March, Putin visited Mariupol, the scene of a months-long Russian siege that left the Ukrainian port city largely in ruins. Almost exactly a year earlier, the city’s drama theater was hit by a Russian strike that killed hundreds of civilians taking shelter inside. Amnesty International said after an investigation that the theater “was clearly recognizable as a civilian object.” Human Rights Watch has determined 93% of 477 high-rise apartment buildings in the city center were damaged in the Russian assault.

‘Largest Construction Project’

Putin was accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, who oversees construction and regional development, as he inspected restoration and infrastructure work in the city, according to the Kremlin. Khusnullin in 2022 called the reconstruction efforts in the occupied territories “the country’s largest construction project.” At the time, he also said 44,000 builders were working in the territories, according to the state-run Tass news service. 

According to a Russian database called Bicotender, last year there were 47 tenders worth more than 2 billion rubles for projects in Mariupol, mainly for constructing residential and administrative buildings, as well as infrastructure work. A decree from occupation authorities in the Kherson region seen by Bloomberg indicated construction work may include de-mining and ensuring security.  Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment from Bloomberg. Mariupol's municipal council, led by its mayor, created an organization called Mariupol Reborn to plan for reconstruction of the city that was home to about half a million people before the war. With Russian troops dug in along the front lines and no sign the occupation will end soon, the plan remains on paper.Many of the companies involved have contracts with the Defense Ministry, said Sergei Khrabrykh, a former defense contractor who now lives outside Russia. Because of that, workers can't make claims against the companies employing them.

Khrabrykh said that some 2,000 migrants ended up working in the occupied areas after being deceived about the nature of the jobs.

Read more: Russia’s War Fuels a Wage Spiral That Threatens Army Recruitment

Russia increasingly relies on migrants in many spheres, including the military sector. This year, Putin signed a decree making it easier for foreigners to obtain Russian citizenship for military service. In late December, he said about 10 million migrants were working in Russia. The economy now needs a record 2.3 million new workers, and 85% of companies in Russia are experiencing staff shortages.

An official with Donetsk’s occupation government, Andrei Chertkov, said thousands of people, from the Donbas as well as other places, were working on projects like repairing energy and gas infrastructure, housing and roads. That work at times takes place just behind the front lines.A Ukrainian government-backed group aimed at supporting resistance in the occupied areas estimated in November that more than 100,000 migrants from Central Asia were in those territories.

All information related to companies involved in contracts with the Russian Defense Ministry is classified. The total numbers of foreigners working or fighting in the occupied territories has never been disclosed. 

Running Afoul  

Over the past year, several former Soviet states including Kazakhstan, Belarus, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, have sentenced people to jail over fighting for Russia in Ukraine, according to reports in local media. Prison terms have ranged from two to 10 years.

Ukraine considers participating in any activity in the territories, not just fighting, as criminal. Collaborating with occupation authorities for money and participating in the eviction of local people can lead to imprisonment in a worker’s home country, lawyers say. The Ukrainian Embassy in Kyrgyzstan warned last year that Kyiv considers foreigners working in its occupied regions to be cooperating with a military aggressor. 

Those who come to Russia in search of work are often ignorant of the law, have a poor command of Russian and don’t realize what they may be signing up for, said one person who works in Moscow on migration issues for citizens of Uzbekistan, but asked not to be identified because he wasn’t authorized to speak to the media.

“This does not change the fact that they are criminals,” Chupik, the human rights lawyer, said. “They are criminals who find themselves in a difficult situation.”

--With assistance from Daryna Krasnolutska.

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