Kenyan authorities announced the suspension of recruitment of their citizens into the Russian army

The Kenyan government announced that it has reached an agreement with Russia to stop recruiting its citizens into the Russian army to participate in the war against Ukraine.

Reuters reports this .

Kenyan Foreign Minister Musalia Mudavadi said that the relevant agreement was reached during negotiations with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov .

According to him , the parties agreed that Kenyan citizens would no longer be recruited into the Russian army through the Russian Ministry of Defense and there would be no new recruitment .

At the same time, there are plans to provide consular assistance to those Kenyans who have already joined the Russian troops .

Mudavadi noted that the country’s government has felt pressure from the families of citizens who went to fight or went missing. At the same time , he stressed that the Kenyan authorities do not want relations with Russia to be defined solely by the issue of war.

In February 2026 , an intelligence report was presented to the Kenyan parliament , stating that Russia had recruited over a thousand of its citizens for the war . This is significantly more than Kenyan authorities had previously assumed .

In early March, protests took place in the country, during which people demanded that the authorities clarify the fate of relatives who may have ended up in the Russian army.

The Russian side claims that Kenyan citizens join the army voluntarily and sign contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense themselves .

As previously reported, Russia has changed its approach to recruiting foreigners to participate in the war against Ukraine. The recruitment of foreign citizens into the Russian army is increasingly being carried out on a systematic basis.

Recall that mercenaries from Africa who fought on the side of Russia against Ukraine received Russian passports.