A 24-year-old youth from Bangladesh’s Cumilla district has reportedly lost his life while fighting for the Russian military in the ongoing conflict with Ukraine. The victim, Md Sagar, a native of Chhaykot village under Chandina municipality, had originally moved to Russia to work in a bakery before being recruited into the armed forces.
Sagar’s family received the news of his death on Saturday when one of his friends residing in Russia called his sister via mobile phone. He was the youngest of five siblings, raised in a financially constrained household by his father, Md Kabir Hossain, a former vegetable vendor now suffering from chronic illnesses.
Before departing for overseas employment, Sagar earned a modest living in Chandina by driving a manual van for a local construction material shop and operating a rickshaw. In mid-2025, through the assistance of the shop’s manager, the family secured a loan of six lakh taka to send Sagar to Russia. Upon arrival, he secured employment at a bakery drawing a monthly salary of 70,000 taka, providing much-needed financial respite to his impoverished family.
However, Sagar’s trajectory changed drastically after he crossed paths with a Bangladeshi middleman operating in Russia. The broker reportedly enticed him with promises of official employment in the Russian armed forces, promising a lucrative single payment of 30 lakh taka alongside high regular remuneration. Despite stern warnings from his uncle, Abdul Awal, who urged him not to abandon his civilian position, Sagar fell prey to the broker’s persuasive guarantees and joined the Russian frontline troops in May 2026.
Following his military deployment to the war front, all communication between Sagar and his family in Bangladesh ceased completely. Recounting the heartbreaking turn of events, Sagar’s father shared that the family had taken on substantial debt to finance his journey abroad, hoping it would lift them out of hardship. He noted that the family had been unable to contact Sagar for the past four to five months prior to receiving the tragic phone call.
The recruitment of foreign nationals, particularly from South Asian nations, into frontline combat roles in Russia has increasingly drawn international attention and worry. Economic hardship and the lure of high compensation packages often make vulnerable migrant workers easy targets for opportunistic recruitment networks operating across foreign borders.
Addressing the incident, Chandina’s Upazila Nirbahi Officer (UNO), Mohammad Ashraful Haq, stated that local administrative officials were not previously informed of Sagar’s military involvement or his reported death, adding that authorities will look into the matter to gather official confirmation.
