By Elias Clure, ABC News
Evans Kibet went to Russia to compete in an athletics event and ended up on the front-lines in Ukraine. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
Evans Kibet's cell in Western Ukraine consists of eight bunks with thin mattresses, a few wooden chairs and a barred window that looks out onto a bleak, concrete prison yard.
Life consists of not very much - reading, three basic meals a day and outdoor time, which is ostensibly an hour-long shuffle in silence.
As autumn becomes winter, the prison camp is bitterly cold.
"Kenya is never cold," Kibet said, speaking of his native country.
Kibet, 36, is being held in Ukraine as a prisoner of war, after being caught on the front-line in a Russian uniform, but he told the ABC he was not a soldier.
Kibet said he was an athlete, who had been the victim of a scam in which he was lured to Russia and thrust into battle.
"I was tricked," he said. "I didn't know what I was doing."
Evans Kibet was a middle-distance runner in his native Kenya. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
He claimed the fraud began in Kenya and the town of Eldoret, a renowned running hub that has produced some of the world's finest athletes. Kibet had spent much of his life trying to break through in the brutally competitive world of Kenyan middle-distance running.
Despite a relatively successful career on the track, athletics wasn't paying the bills. Compared to other runners, he was also getting old.
"I didn't make money, because I needed to go outside Kenya [to compete]," he said. "I was waiting for that time to come and I kept on training, but I was unlucky, because I got many invitations from Europe, from the US, but things would never work out with visas."
In July, a man approached him with an offer that seemed too good to be true - an all-expenses-paid trip to St Petersburg, where he'd receive an allowance and some money for competing in an athletics "festival".
Kibet was so excited by the deal that he never even asked how much money he'd be paid.
"For me, it was like they pay everything, I don't have to pay anything," he said. "Then I was like, 'Okay, let me go and visit'.
"In Kenya, running wasn't supporting me [financially] and I wanted to help my family."
Ukraine uses five separate locations to house prisoners of war it has captured. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
He met the man again in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, and introductions to others who would join them on the Russian odyssey followed.
"One was a basketballer… many of them were athletes," Kibet said.
They boarded a flight to Istanbul and then another to St Petersburg. Kibet said he and the fellow Kenyan athletes were treated to sightseeing and swanky dinners in Russia's cultural capital, and after a few days, he was presented with an offer to extend his visa.
"They took me to this hotel. We were there with these other guys and a man asked me, 'Would you like to stay more days in Russia?'
"I told him, 'Yeah, Russia is good'.
"He asked me, 'If I offer you a job and you will get one year in Russia, will you accept it?' I said yes, I wanted to support my family."
The contract was in Russian and Kibet admitted he didn't ask anyone about what, specifically, he was signing.
"I trusted this man," he said. "I thought he wanted good for me, so I signed this contract."
Evans Kibet has no idea when he will be released. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
He claimed he was then taken to an office building, where he signed more paperwork and handed over his passport to the man who had lured him to Russia, who left the room.
Kibet hadn't seen him again.
The athlete was then instructed to get into a car, where he was driven to the outskirts of the city. When the car pulled up to its final location, Evans realised the contract he signed meant he had been conscripted to the Russian military.
For a week, he said, he received basic, rudimentary training, before being moved again. This time, he was going to war.
Suddenly, the Kenyan runner was in a foxhole on the front-line, a deadly theatre filled with drones and missiles, and the constant drilling sound of artillery fire.
When asked what it was like, Kibet lowered his eyes and winced.
"That place, it's not good," he said. "You wait for your death."
Foreign fighters 'tricked by Russia'
Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which was launched in February 2022, is devastatingly deadly.
While neither Kyiv nor Moscow release their casualty figures, it's estimated they run into the hundreds of thousands on each side.
Russia's ground assaults on Ukrainian front-line positions have been described as "meat grinder" and drawn comparison with Kamikaze-style tactics.
Kibet was certain he would die there, but once on the battlefield, he ran towards an open space, where he was spotted by a group of soldiers. They were Ukrainian.
Ukrainian officials have not yet said when the foreign fighters they have captured might be released. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
He was not the first African man Ukrainian forces had found on the front-line.
Ukraine's foreign ministry said 1436 Africans from 36 countries on the continent were in Russia's ranks.
The ABC met at least a dozen prisoners of war at the camp where Evans was held.
Some had similar stories to Evans, but others acknowledged that they were mercenaries and had volunteered to fight for Russian forces.
"We have dozens and dozens of non-Russians in the camp," said Peter Yatsenko, a spokesperson for Ukraine's prisoners-of-war camps. "We don't know the exact number, but there are a lot here.
"Almost all of them say they were tricked by Russia, most say they knew they were going to Russia and some knew they were going to war, but many were unaware of the conditions on the front-line in this bloody war."
Evans Kibet said he was tricked into joining Russia's military. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
The Kenyan government said 200 of its citizens were fighting for Russia and had demanded Kyiv return them.
When asked why Ukraine didn't just release the men and return them to their native countries, Yatsenko said the government was willing to consider it.
"Ukraine is very open to any negotiation with any government with the country of origin of these prisoners of war," he said. "There might be investigations [into how they ended up in Russia], but they were captured as soldiers of our enemy's army."
Kyiv is also restricted by the delicate diplomatic cat-and-mouse game that's seen prisoner swaps used as currency in the war.
One way Ukraine can retrieve its soldiers trapped in Russia is to release the Russians it has in custody. Foreign fighters are likely to have very little value in these exchanges.
Ukraine's priority is the return of its own POWs in Russia.
For these inmates, time outdoors in Ukraine's freezing winter is a rarity. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
The Ukrainian government often allows media into POW camps to inspect conditions. Kyiv is keen to show the world that the Russian soldiers are being treated humanely.
There are five camps across the country and the one the ABC was shown is said to be the most comfortable of the locations, but the prisoners hardly live a life of luxury.
The facilities are basic and living conditions are bare.
The captives cannot call their families, and letters take months to reach their loved ones, so many have no idea if they're alive or dead.
Some African inmates the ABC spoke to said their inability to contact their families was cruel. Many begged us to secretly use our phones, so they could connect with their loved ones.
Conditions inside the prison are basic. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
Atam, a Cameroonian who worked as a maths teacher, was one of those men.
"I want to see my wife, my family, everybody," he told the ABC, saying that he was only supposed to be in Russia for a short stay, after being promised a job that would allow him to support his family.
"I found myself in a situation where all I had to do was sign," he said. "I didn't know how to read the contract, so to tell you the truth, I was in a situation I didn't really understand."
Like Kibet, he insisted he had no idea he'd be sent to the Ukraine front-line and asked to fight for Russia.
"I'm a teacher, after all, I'm not a soldier," he said. "I don't know anything about war.
"I found myself in a situation I suddenly couldn't control."
Inmates here spend most of their time in their cells. Photo: ABC News / Daniel Pannett
Russia's President Vladimir Putin previously said Moscow had "no need" for foreign fighters, but Ukraine estimates more than 18,000 foreigners are in Russia's ranks.
South Korea's spy agency believes North Korea sent 10,000-12,000 of its soldiers to fight for Russia in 2024.
Dr Joseph Seigle, a director of the Washington-based Africa Centre for Strategic Studies, said the Kremlin increasingly looked to Africa to help its war effort.
It also used the dire economic situations in many African countries as an opportunity to lure vulnerable men, desperate to support their families.
"Jobs are scarce in Africa, especially mid-type paying positions, so if they are advertising along those lines, then they're going to attract a high level of attention," Seigle said.
"African governments are aware and they don't want their citizens recruited this way, so this is happening on the margins and on the fringes of the information space, but the financial incentive is what generates the attention."
The governments of Kenya and Ukraine have been contacted for comment.
- ABC
