Prime Cabinet Secretary and Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi has raised alarm over the growing number of Kenyans being lured into or finding their way into foreign conflicts, warning that many are joining wars without fully understanding the risks involved.

Speaking while addressing delegates during the 60^th anniversary of the Association of Evangelicals in Africa in Nairobi on Friday, February 27, 2026, the foreign affairs minister has stated that Kenya is facing the challenge of its own Kenyans finding their way through whatever means to go and fight in a war they do not understand.

Mudavadi has insisted that this is something that must concern the country.

“We are facing the challenge of our own Kenyans finding their way through whatever means to go and fight in a war they don’t understand. This is something that we must be concerned about as a country,” Mudavadi remarked.

“Some of these young people are being misled through misinformation, false promises, and irregular recruitment channels. They end up exposing themselves to danger and suffering consequences they never anticipated,” the CS added.

The prime cabinet secretary has said the government is committed to taking diplomatic and legal measures to ensure that Kenyans are protected and that those responsible for illegal recruitment are held accountable.

Over 1000 Kenyans stuck in Russia-Ukraine war

More than 1,000 Kenyans have been lured to fight for Russia in its war with Ukraine, according to an intelligence report to the Kenyan parliament that highlights the scale of a Russian operation taking African men to the frontline.

The majority leader of Kenya’s National Assembly, Kimani Ichung’wah, said “rogue recruitment agencies and individuals in Kenya” were continuing to send Kenyan nationals to fight in the conflict, as he read MPs the summary of an investigation by Kenya’s National Intelligence Service.

According to the intelligence report, Ichung’wah said employment agencies were targeting former military personnel and police officers and civilians from their mid-20s to 50 years old “who are desperate for job opportunities abroad”.

The employment agencies were enticing Kenyans by promising them monthly salaries of about Ksh350,000 shillings (£2,000), bonuses of between Ksh900,000 and Ksh1.2 million and eventual Russian citizenship, the report said.

It also accused the employment agencies of colluding with staff from several government agencies – the Directorate of Immigration Services, the Directorate of Criminal Investigations and its Anti-Narcotics Unit, and the National Employment Authority – to prevent interception at Nairobi’s international airport, Ichung’wah said.

It further claimed that the agencies worked with staff at the Russian embassy in Kenya and the Kenyan embassy in Moscow to get the recruits Russian visitor visas, he said.

The figure of more than 1,000 individuals is a significant increase on the number given in a statement by Kenya’s foreign affairs ministry in November, which said that more than 200 Kenyans had travelled to fight in the war.

A growing number of people from African countries – including Kenya, Uganda and South Africa – and elsewhere have been lured to the frontline as Russia seeks manpower to sustain its invasion. Ukraine’s foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, said in November that more than 1,400 people from 36 African countries were fighting for Russia in Ukraine. Many are being held by Ukraine as prisoners of war.