By Murad Rakhimov | 2024-11-07

TASHKENT -- Russian security personnel have not only been persecuting migrant workers but also residents who are trying to prevent them from being sent to the so-called special military operation in Ukraine.

One of them is Jurabek Amonov, an Uzbek blogger and rights activist who runs a YouTube and Telegram channel called Suyanch (Pillar) about migrant life.

Since the start of the invasion, he has been urging fellow Uzbeks not to sign contracts with the Defense Ministry in exchange for Russian citizenship.

But in mid-September, the Kremlin deported him to Uzbekistan, and he now lives in Bukhara.

"I'm opposed to other Uzbeks signing a contract with the Russian Defense Ministry and going to fight in order to earn money or get a [citizenship] passport. I even told them that," Amonov told Kontur.

"I said, don't go to war. You won't come back alive."

Uzbekistan, which does not recognize dual citizenship, has repeatedly warned its citizens against taking part in combat in foreign states.

Uzbek citizens who fight abroad face prosecution under the statute prohibiting mercenary activities.

As Russia suffers from a shortage of "cannon fodder" after taking staggering casualties in Ukraine, it has become impossible for migrant workers to avoid becoming a target for the Russian Defense Ministry.

Russian forces have suffered more than 700,000 casualties since the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022, the Ukrainian military said in early November.

The Russian migration register included almost 6.2 million foreign citizens as of September, according to the Russian Interior Ministry.

Efforts to simplify the citizenship process, increased pay for military contracts and other new privileges for contract signers suggest "Russia is catastrophically short on manpower for combat," said Botirjon Shermukhammedov, the editor of the Migrant.uz website.

Since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the ruling establishment has dialed up the pressure on migrants, he said.

This year alone, lawmakers have made 19 proposals to amend the law on the status of foreign citizens in Russia.

Officials introduced work restrictions for foreigners in almost 20 provinces in Russia. In July, the State Duma passed a package of three laws on a "special deportation regime" aimed at migrants.

"Almost every week some official or member of parliament puts forward a negative proposal related to migrants. They want to silence not just ordinary migrants but also those who are defending their rights," Shermukhammedov said.

'I came here to work, not to fight'

Sunnat, 38, is from southern Uzbekistan and has been living in Moscow for a decade.

He has worked as a cook and construction worker in the Russian capital and now delivers food for a living.

Despite having a work permit, Sunnat said he was detained by police in September.

"I was taken to the district police station, where there were around 15 people like me. The captain, who was the chief at the station, immediately made me an offer to sign a contract with the Defense Ministry," Sunnat told Kontur.

"He said I could earn more money and get a Russian [citizenship] passport. Of course I said no. I told the captain that I came here to work, not to fight."

Migrants are regularly detained outdoors and at home, he added.

The Russian government does not want the political cost of recruiting too many city-dwelling men who are only children, said Alexander Kim, a blogger and activist who fights xenophobia and prejudice in Russia.

That man's "family is often made up of a mother and sometimes a grandmother -- women of retirement and pre-retirement age who represent the 'nucleus' of Putin's voting base," Kim told Kontur.

If their children and grandchildren return from the war disabled or in coffins, these women's devotion to the regime might wobble and they might stop supporting Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The regime is taking that risk into account and now recruits men whose relatives will not protest downtown in Russian cities and lack the ability to affect election outcomes, said Kim.

So it targets Russian citizens with a migrant past, foreigners and members of ethnic minorities who live on the fringes of the country, said Kim.

Run-of-the-mill racism

While Russian propaganda has long portrayed migrant workers as potential criminals or terrorists, Russian authorities are deliberately "inflaming" conflict with migrants in the media in order to distract the public from other problems, such as the drawn-out war in Ukraine and inflation, sources close to the Kremlin say, according to a September report by Meduza.

"To be sure, anti-migrant rhetoric is one of Russia's standard ways of responding to economic problems," said Kim, the blogger and activist.

After being incited by nationalist propaganda for decades, Russian society is now demanding stiffer policies toward migrants even though they are far from necessary.

"Russia needs migrants, and a big chunk of the political elite gets that. Without migrant workers, the economic situation in the country will be significantly worse than it is with them," Kim said.

Sunnat predicted that until the war ends, he and other natives of CIS countries will not be left alone, and that is why he plans to leave Russia before the new year.

"I don't want to kill people, and I don't want to die, not even for large sums of money," he said.