Russia is deploying Chinese and Iranian combat drones in its full-scale war against Ukraine. It is also fielding North Korean soldiers and ballistic missiles. Soon, Russia might send Yemeni fighters into battle, according to reporting from the Financial Times newspaper.
The paper said Yemen's Islamist Houthi militia is recruiting men for deployment in the Russian military and that it has already sent hundreds of fighters to Russia through a "shadowy trafficking operation."
Citing some of the men involved, the Financial Times said Yemeni individuals were promised salaried employment and citizenship in Russia. When they arrived in the country, the men were forced to join the Russian army and sent to the front lines in Ukraine.
The Financial Times reported that men are being recruited through a company founded by a prominent Houthi politician. It also said it has seen a recruitment contract indicating Yemeni men have been recruited into the Russian military since July 2024. The Iran-backed Houthi militia has repeatedly attacked Western tankers in the Gulf of Aden, for example, since the Israel-Hamas war began just over a year ago.
World War III looming?
The German Foreign Ministry has said it would "be extremely worrying" if this report proved true. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also expressed concern, saying the danger of "global war" was "serious and real."
What is the danger of this war escalating even further?
Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine's former army chief who now serves as the country's ambassador to the UK, said World War III had already begun as so many different nations were already involved in the Ukraine war.
Russian troops have suffered 700,000 casualties so far, according to recent estimates. This is probably one reason why some 12,000 North Korean soldiers have been sent to fight in Russia by Pyongyang ruler Kim Jong Un, particularly in the Kursk region.
News about Yemeni fighters in Ukraine also reached the G7 foreign ministers meeting in Italy, with Germany's Annalena Baerbock saying, "If this is confirmed, it will once again underline that there are no limits to the Russian president's conduct of the war."
Roderich Kiesewetter, a foreign policy expert with the opposition German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) parliamentary group, said he was not surprised by reports of Yemeni fighters now engaged in Ukraine.
"Russia has had enormous resource problems for some time, both in terms of materials and personnel," Kiesewetter told DW. "It now has to pay Russian soldiers very high sums to be mobilized and is offering them debt relief."
Kiesewetter said Russian President Vladimir Putin was already working with Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and the Houthi militia, both of which are supported by Iran.
"It is, therefore, not surprising that Yemeni fighters are being recruited," the German lawmaker told DW. "There are indications that these are not Houthi terrorists, but Yemenis who are being lured to Russia with false promises and then recruited [into the army] by force."
Ukraine war becomes German election topic
German politicians have repeatedly warned against a further escalation of the Ukraine war, both militarily, in terms of personnel and financially. Germany is currently one of Ukraine's strongest supporters, alongside the United States. Yet it is uncertain what role the US will play once President-elect Donald Trump takes over in the White House.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz of the Social Democrats (SPD) is keen to cast himself as a "chancellor of peace" as an election campaign gets underway ahead of snap elections expected in February. Scholz has refused to supply Ukraine with Germany's Taurus missile system — which can be used to strike targets inside Russia — despite Kyiv's repeated requests and approval from other Western allies to use their longer-range weapons against targets in Russia.
Scholz recently said that "even though we are the biggest and most reliable supporter of the country's defense, we are not doing certain things — for example, delivering cruise missiles [to Ukraine], for example accepting that the dangerous weapons we have supplied can be used to attack targets deep in Russia."
The ever-escalating Ukraine war is likely to dominate the German election campaign. The latest representative ARD-Deutschlandtrend survey conducted by pollster infratest-dimap found that 61% of respondents were against supplying the German Taurus missile system to Ukraine.