Exploited in Russia: African Women Forced to Make Drones

Moscow: They hoped for a better career but ended up in Russia's war factories. A new study reveals how young women, mainly from Africa, have been exploited. Some of those affected have shared their stories with DW.According to Deutsche Welle, Aminata, a 20-year-old from Sierra Leone, plans to leave her home country to pursue an apprenticeship in Russia, aided by the Alabuga Start program. The program, named after an industrial area in southwestern Russia, covers travel costs and provides dormitories for participants. However, many arrivals find themselves assembling cheap drones under poor conditions, as revealed by a report from the Global Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime.DW reached out to several program participants, who mostly refrained from speaking on the record due to fear of reprisals. Chinara, a young Nigerian woman who participated in the Alabuga program, shared her experiences via social media. She described being turned into a hard laborer with low wages, despite initial promis es of opportunities in logistics, service, and other fields. Instead, many were assigned to a drone assembly factory or other menial tasks, exposed to dangerous chemicals.The Alabuga SEZ is a significant production hub for Geran-2 drones, utilized in attacks on Ukraine. Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the facility expanded its military production capabilities. Labor shortages in war-torn Russia have led recruiters to focus on migrant workers from the Global South. Official Russian government data indicates a significant increase in African workers arriving in Russia, with most originating from countries such as Cameroon, Nigeria, and Burkina Faso.The Alabuga Start program primarily recruited African women aged 18 to 22 but has since expanded to other regions. The study's authors conducted interviews and analyzed data to uncover the exploitative conditions faced by young women at the Alabuga Polytech training facility. Co-author Julia Stanyard highlighted the fraudulent nature of the progra m, where participants were not informed of their actual roles and found themselves trapped in exploitative conditions.Parents in Zimbabwe expressed concerns over their children involved in the program, with reports of forced labor and withheld wages. In Botswana, Interpol has launched an investigation into the Alabuga Start program's potential involvement in human trafficking, as awareness of the program's risks grows in countries like Kenya and Tanzania.The Alabuga Start program did not respond to DW's request for comment. Garikai Mafirakureva in Zimbabwe and Aleksei Strelnikov contributed reporting to this article, adapted from German.