Mines in Occupied Territories Being Closed, Miners Recruited to Work in Russia

In 2020, the occupying power has closed more than 40 mines in the territories of Donbas not controlled by the Government of Ukraine. Now recruiters from Russia are luring miners into working in the Russian Federation.

“It has been established that the so-called recruits from the Russian Federation work in the temporarily occupied areas of Luhansk and Donetsk regions, luring interested miners into working in the mines of the Russian Federation in Kemerovo and Rostov regions, Khabarovsk Krai. The obligatory condition is expedited issuance of Russian passports,” Pavlo Lysianskyi, a representative of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights in Donetsk and Luhansk regions, wrote on Facebook.

According to Lysiansky, 19 mines in the occupied areas of the Luhansk region and 22 mines in the Donetsk region have been closed this year.

“According to our information, whole brigades of miners from the temporarily occupied areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions go to the mines of the Russian Federation, explaining that wages in the Russian mines are paid more or less on time, while the invaders in the occupied Donbas have not paid off the wage arrears to many miners yet, and it is almost impossible to go to other countries to earn money during the pandemic,” the Commissioner’s representative stressed.

Taking into account the workload, the wages in the Russian mines are low, he noted. Accordingly, local workers “protest very often, but the Russian Federation has decided to arrange competition involving residents of the occupied Donbas, citizens of Ukraine. To put simply, the mines have been closed and the able-bodied population has been integrated into their mines,” Lysiansky explained.

Bohdan Marusyak