THREE Filipino men allegedly recruited for military and border guard jobs in Eastern Europe were detained at Davao International Airport after falsely claiming they were headed to Thailand for a Muay Thai tournament, the Bureau of Immigration (BI) said Monday.
The BI said the men were promised monthly salaries of P200,000 to work as soldiers or border guards, raising concerns about a possible illegal recruitment and human trafficking scheme.
The men were stopped on Oct. 17 after immigration officers found inconsistencies in their declared travel plans.
Further questioning revealed that Thailand was just a transit point, with the men expecting to proceed to Eastern Europe after their electronic visas were provided.
They said two individuals, “Alexander” and “Oleg,” recruited them and arranged their deployment. Some of the men said they encountered the recruiters through Facebook and Telegram.
The three were instructed on Oct. 13 to leave through a supposed “backdoor” route in Zamboanga, but the plan was changed to air travel through Davao.
The BI’s Immigration Protection and Border Enforcement Section referred the three men to the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking for further investigation and assessment.
BI Commissioner Joel Anthony Viado said the interception underscored the need for stricter scrutiny of overseas job offers, particularly those involving unusually high salaries, unclear employment arrangements and questionable travel plans.
“Filipinos must be cautious of recruiters who promise high salaries but provide unclear employment arrangements or questionable travel plans,” Viado said, urging jobseekers to verify employers and recruitment agencies through the Department of Migrant Workers.
The Davao incident follows a series of similar cases in which Filipinos were recruited for military or security-related work abroad.
In September, immigration officials at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) intercepted four Filipino men who were attempting to travel to Russia for military or security roles. The group initially claimed their destinations were Thailand or Vietnam.
One of the men said they were promised a monthly salary of P150,000, along with the prospect of Russian citizenship after one year of service.
In August, authorities intercepted 14 suspected trafficking victims at NAIA and Clark International Airport, all of whom were recruited for employment in Russia.
The individuals initially provided conflicting accounts of their travel plans, with six men claiming they were vacationing with former military colleagues and eight others claiming they were on business trips. They later disclosed they were hired to work in Russia for $3,000 a month. Two suspected recruiters were apprehended during the operation.
The recruitment pattern points to the use of social media, misleading travel declarations and third-party sponsors to facilitate potentially dangerous overseas deployments.
In February, the Department of Foreign Affairs said seven Filipinos had been recruited to join Russian forces. One of them was reported to have been killed, and several others were being held as prisoners of war in Ukraine.
