A Russian Company Operating in Uganda Is Taking 83% of the Signing Bonus Before Recruits Even Board the Plane. A Leaked Contract Shows How.

I Want to Live project has obtained a sample application form used by Meteorinvestproekt LLC (ООО "Метеоринвестпроект" in Russian), a Russian company operating in Uganda to recruit men into Russia's army. The document, drafted in Kampala and dated October 10, 2025, was addressed to company General Director V.S. Tikhonov, makes the financial extraction scheme explicit - written into the contract the recruit is asked to sign.

The Scheme

The basic pitch targets young men in the poorest countries with promises of rear-line support work, a monthly salary of $2,000-$2,500 and a one-time signing bonus of $5,000-$6,000. Meteorinvestproekt frames its role as providing a paid "service" - helping the recruit obtain a Russian visa, preparing documents, buying air tickets, assisting with departure from Uganda, and accompanying the recruit in Russia until the military contract is signed.

The cost of that service, as specified in the document, is 2,500,000 roubles (~$27,800 USD). The signing bonus the Russian Ministry of Defense pays is 3,000,000 roubles (~$33,300 USD). The recruit receives the difference: 500,000 roubles (~$5,600 USD) - approximately 17% of the total. The other 83% goes to Meteorinvestproekt before the recruit reaches the front.

See also: Story about Brazilian recruiters who lured their fellow citizens into Russia's army, stole their pay and vanished

The Monthly Extraction

Most recruitment companies take their cut once, at signing. Meteorinvestproekt goes even further.

The contract also specifies a monthly fee for ongoing "legal support" - a call centre for the recruit and his family, plus assistance with transferring funds home. The cost: 70,000 roubles per month (~$780 USD).

The monthly salary promised to recruits by the Russian military is 230,000 roubles (~$2,560 USD). After Meteorinvestproekt's monthly deduction, the net figure is 160,000 roubles (~$1,780 USD).

The company collects this fee every month the recruit is alive. The I Want to Live project notes that this is a more sophisticated extraction than most recruiters use: rather than a one-time cut, Meteorinvestproekt has built a recurring revenue stream from each contracted soldier - for as long as he survives.

The contract also includes a clause allowing the company to transfer "insurance compensation funds" to the recruit's relatives in the event of his death, for which it requests a notarised power of attorney. That provision positions Meteorinvestproekt to handle - and intercept - death compensation payments as well. Foreign nationals who managed to flee the Russian military trap report local handlers positioning themselves from the outset to intercept every payment. Samuel Maina Kariuki, a former Kenyan Defence Forces member recruited for a supposed mall security job, describes being taken to a bank on arrival in St. Petersburg where the paperwork - in Russian, no translation offered - listed his handler as next of kin and designated his signing bonus to transfer directly to that handler rather than to him. When a fellow recruit tried to install the bank app to access his own account, the handler caught him and struck him. WiFi was cut off immediately after they left the building. He never accessed the money. He returned from Ukraine with shrapnel still in his neck and three fragments in his thigh he cannot afford to remove, his family KES 120,000 (~$920) in debt from the cost of bringing him home.

What the Recruit Actually Gets

The I Want to Live project is direct in its assessment: "For Russians, foreign citizens are literal cannon fodder. The Russian MoD uses them for assault missions, and Russian recruiters earn millions of roubles from each contracted soldier they bring in. The recruit himself gets only crumbs from the table - which he most likely will not receive at all, since he will die in another pointless assault."

The Meteorinvestproekt contract is not exceptional in its deception. It is exceptional in how thoroughly it documents the deception in writing, requiring the recruit to sign a document that specifies, in plain terms, the amounts being extracted from him. 

People who were lured into Russia's army have a chance to avoid the fate of this report's subjects through the "I Want to Live" project. Read more details here.

Source: I Want to Live