May 23, 2026
Belarusian National Searching for Shift Work Tricked Into Signing Russian Military Contract, Assigned to Assault Unit
The "I Want to Live" project has published the case of Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Lazukov, a Belarusian national born November 30, 1980, who was deceived into signing a contract with the Russian Ministry of Defense.
Lazukov was searching for shift work and found what appeared to be a suitable job vacancy online. He signed the documents without reading them. Suspicions came only once he was already inside a military unit. By then it was too late - his attempts to terminate the contract and return home to Belarus were unsuccessful. He was assigned to assault operations.
On the photo: screenshot from a video of Lazukov stating that he was scammed into military service in Russia, captured on I Want to Live Telegram channel.
The case is consistent with a pattern the "I Want to Live" project has documented across dozens of nationalities: a job advertisement, documents signed without full understanding of their contents, and a military unit that has no intention of letting the recruit leave.
Russia describes Belarus as a "brotherly nation." Whether that extends to letting its citizens go home after being deceived into military service is a different matter entirely.