There Was a Reason Behind the Marriage... "Black Widows" Targeting 200 Million Won Death Compensation

Sham Marriages for Soldier Compensation Spreading in Russia
Minimum Payout Exceeds 100 Million KRW; Actual Receipts Around 260 Million KRW
Legislation Proposes Maximum Sentence of 10 Years in Prison

In Russia, cases of sham marriages aimed at claiming compensation for casualties in the Ukraine war have been on the rise.

A photo to help understand the article showing soldiers of a Russian engineering unit. Photo by TASS Yonhap News Agency

On August 4 (local time), Yonhap News cited a report by CNN stating that "large lump-sum payments granted to the families of soldiers killed during their military service are being targeted by organized marriage scams." Locally, women engaging in such schemes are referred to as "Black Widows." When a Russian soldier is killed in action, their immediate family receives at least 5 million rubles (approximately 10.3 million won) in a lump-sum payment. The legal spouse is the first in line among family members to receive this money. By securing spousal status through a sham marriage, sending the husband to the front lines, and then, upon notification of death, claiming the entire compensation ahead of the parents and children, perpetrators secure the funds for themselves.

The actual payout often far exceeds the minimum requirement. When combining the lump-sum payment by presidential decree, the payout from state-owned insurance, and local government compensation, bereaved families reportedly receive over 13 million rubles (about 26.9 million won). According to the U.S. foreign affairs magazine Foreign Policy, there was an incident last November in Nizhnevartovsk, Russia, where a woman consecutively married four men, all of whom were later killed in action, enabling her to collect 15 million rubles (around 31 million won).

One case introduced by CNN involved a woman named Maria, who learned of her 59-year-old father's death in action—along with the belated revelation that he had married a woman 22 years his junior. He enlisted two days after registering the marriage and died on the front line. The new stepmother, whom Maria had never met, acquired the legal status of direct family and became eligible to receive the compensation payment; even the apartment where her father had lived had already been sold. The whereabouts of this "widow" remain unknown.

Since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Russian government has encouraged marriage under the pretext of boosting the morale and combat motivation of new recruits. The usual waiting period for marriage registration was removed, and local governments streamlined the process by holding mass wedding ceremonies. The extremely low survival rate for soldiers deployed to the front lines has created an opportunity to obtain huge sums of money in a short period, exploiting this loophole.

Among cases covered by Russian media, a military hospital nurse was dismissed after marrying five injured soldiers in rapid succession and then collecting compensation after their deaths. There have also been indications that military personnel conspired with women to assign newly enlisted husbands to dangerous missions and later split the death benefits. In one instance, a real estate agent introduced marriage to a soon-to-be front-line recruit as a means of acquiring a home on a podcast, for which she was indicted and sentenced to community service.

The Russian government has encouraged marriage under the pretext of boosting the morale and combat motivation of new recruits. President Vladimir Putin. Photo by AP Yonhap News.

The Russian judiciary has also started to respond. Last summer, a court in Bryansk Oblast ruled that the marriage between a fallen soldier and his spouse was a sham and declared it invalid—the first such ruling of its kind.

In the political sphere, there have been calls to establish new criminal penalties. Lawmakers from the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) submitted a bill to the State Duma last August that defines sham marriage as a separate offense, punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs, urged, "The families of those participating in the special military operation must be protected from brazen criminals, as well as from financial and voice-phishing fraudsters and predators seeking compensation."

However, some argue that legislation will not resolve the problem. Nina Ostanina, a member of the State Duma, claimed that sham marriage falls within the domain of morality, saying, "Morality cannot be regulated by law."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.