A source from the Cheka-OGPU spoke about a collective statement by citizens of Tajikistan who complained that they were not paid money for digging trenches in a war zone. According to the interlocutor, on February 14, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the FSB received information about an appeal from 32 visitors from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, who said that they had previously worked near Lugansk – digging trenches and erecting defensive fortifications for money. At the beginning of the year, the brigade was in the Moscow region. Businessman Sergei Konoplev from the village of Bely Rast (Dmitrovsky district, Moscow region) contacted the senior digger. He said that the foreman’s contact was shared with colleagues from the LPR, where the newcomers had previously worked, and offered a job – to dig 500 meters of trenches 2.5 meters deep in the Zaporozhye region for 800 thousand rubles. According to the migrant workers, they had to work right on the front line and no one entered into any contracts with them – all the conditions were on their word of honor. They spent 22 days in the war zone and had to dig as many as three lines of trenches of 500 meters each and strengthen dugouts. The diggers were met on the spot by Sergei’s people, who had a warehouse with tools nearby. The workers were placed in houses abandoned by Ukrainians and were given almost no food. During all this time, 600 thousand rubles were transferred to the brigade. The applicants claim that they were not given the promised 200 thousand rubles and that it was the military, not the employer, who helped them get out of the Zaporozhye region.
In the photo, Konoplev is sitting in a down jacket.
“ВЧК ОГПУ”