According to Ulys media and Radio Azattyk, Kazakhstani recruiting websites posted ads looking for workers to rebuild the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, which was destroyed during the war. The announcement of a “shift job in Russia” is in high demand, according to the recruiting agency. It says that “a large company” requires construction workers to restore Mariupol under a certain state program: “Mariupol, formerly a city of Ukraine in the Donetsk region, is documented as Russian, restoration work is already underway – the hostilities are over.” In a conversation with an Azattyk journalist, a recruiting agency employee said that eleven people from Kazakhstan would go to Mariupol on December 14.
Azattyk turned to the National Security Committee, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs for comment, where they were told that they “did not hear about it.” The Embassy of Kazakhstan in Ukraine replied that “no one addressed this issue to the embassy.”
Such activities of Kazakhstani recruiting agencies, as well as the Russian contractors behind them, are illegal and put the lives of Kazakhstani citizens at risk. Mariupol is an integral part of Ukraine, crossing the Ukrainian state border by foreigners in places where there are no checkpoints (i.e., in the temporarily occupied territories) and working without permits is a violation of the laws of the country.