Eleven South African men who were allegedly recruited to fight alongside Russian forces in Ukraine are set to return home, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced Tuesday.
Their arrival will raise to 15 the number of South Africans repatriated from the Russia-Ukraine war in recent days. Four men touched down in Johannesburg last week after spending months on the front lines.
Authorities say the group was misled into traveling to Russia with promises of security training, only to find themselves drawn into the conflict.
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Two more South Africans are still in Russia. One is hospitalized, while the other is undergoing administrative processing ahead of an expected return, Ramaphosa said. He noted that the repatriation efforts followed diplomatic engagement between South Africa and Russia, after Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged cooperation earlier this month.
“The South African government working closely with the Russian government has secured a safe return of the men. The investigation into the circumstances that led to the recruitment of these young men into mercenary activities is ongoing,” Ramaphosa said in a statement.
The recruitment network is now under investigation. At least three individuals are being probed, among them Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla, daughter of former President Jacob Zuma. She has rejected allegations of involvement but stepped down from her parliamentary seat after the claims surfaced.
Concerns about the men’s safety first emerged in December, when the government disclosed that it had received distress calls from South Africans stranded in the embattled eastern Donbas region of Ukraine. The men, aged between 20 and 39, were said to have signed what they believed were lucrative employment contracts, only to be absorbed into mercenary units.
Their ordeal corresponds to reports from other African countries. An intelligence briefing presented to Kenya’s parliament last week indicated that more than 1,000 Kenyans may have been recruited to fight in Ukraine. In recent weeks, Kenyan families have appealed publicly for assistance, saying relatives were either forced into combat roles or captured as prisoners of war.
Back home, the four South Africans who returned last week have since been reunited with their families. Thulani Mahlangu, a relative of one of the men, said they were questioned by police upon arrival before being allowed to leave.
“They were questioned for quite sometime when they arrived here in South Africa because there is still an investigation about how the ended up in Russia. But they were released after talking to the police,” Mahlangu told The Associated Press.
South African law prohibits citizens from participating in foreign armed conflicts without formal government authorization. Investigators are now working to determine how the men were recruited and whether any local facilitators violated that prohibition.
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