Cross-Border Military Recruitment in Protracted Conflicts: Yemeni Pathways into the Russia–Ukraine War — Structural Drivers, Operational Mechanisms, and International-Law Analysis
Authors:
,
Journal: Multidisciplinary International Research Journal
Abstract
This article examines the systematic recruitment of Yemeni youth into the Russian armed
forces for deployment in the Russia–Ukraine war, a phenomenon documented by investigative
and human-rights reporting since mid-2024. The recruitment pipeline reportedly
operates through nominally civilian companies in Oman linked to Houthi commander Abdulwali
Al-Jabri, designated by the U.S. Treasury in March 2025 under Executive Order 13224.
Although this phenomenon lies at the intersection of trafficking-in-persons and foreignfighter
studies, it remains under-theorised in both fields. This article reconstructs the
political-economic, historical, and operational dynamics of the Yemen–Russia recruitment
pipeline; evaluates documented practices under the Palermo Protocol, ILO Convention
No. 29, the Rome Statute, the ILC Articles on State Responsibility, and jus cogens norms;
assesses associated risks; and introduces conflict-driven military trafficking (CDMT) as
a sub-type of trafficking-for-forced-labour. CDMT is defined through three necessary
conditions (vitiated consent; military service in an active conflict zone; intermediary networks
with coercive or deceptive capacity), two characterising features (recruitment from
populations in protracted conflict; cross-border transit), and three sufficient conditions (deployment
to combat or war-support labour; inability to withdraw freely; systemic operation).
Using qualitative multi-source triangulation, the study combines thematic content analysis,
legal doctrinal analysis, and structured expert risk assessment based on investigative
journalism, human-rights documentation, intergovernmental materials, and primary evidence.
The article also examines the structural dimensions of economic and social fragility
in Yemen, the operational mechanisms of the recruitment and transit networks, and the
legal questions raised by contracts, consent, and freedom of withdrawal. Drawing on the
available evidence, the analysis applies the Palermo Protocol, ILO Convention No. 29, the
Rome Statute, and the ILC Articles on State Responsibility, and finds that the documented
practices satisfy the three Palermo trafficking elements and raise prima facie questions
of state responsibility under ARSIWA Articles 4, 8, 14, and 16, while acknowledging that
several attribution thresholds remain contingent on further evidentiary development. The
study advances an analytical approach for understanding patterns of military recruitment
associated with protracted conflicts in transnational contexts, without presupposing a final
legal characterisation of every individual case.
Keywords: Yemen, Russia–Ukraine war, conflict-driven military trafficking, human trafficking, Palermo Protocol, state responsibility, due diligence, mercenaries, Houthi, jus cogens, moral injury, foreign fighters