Officials in Orenburg said they were unable to hire street cleaners from North Korea
Albert Yumadilov, mayor of Orenburg, Russia, stated that the city was unable to recruit workers from North Korea for street-cleaning positions due to their excessively high wage demands.
According to the official, the North Korean workers refused to work for the offered salary of about 55,000 rubles per month. He noted that their expectations were reportedly two to three times higher.
“I worked on this issue last year, but I wasn’t successful. Workers from North Korea won’t come for 55,000 rubles. Wages there are two to three times higher,” Yumadilov said.
At the same time, the mayor spoke positively about the efficiency of workers from North Korea, noting that they perform their work with high productivity.
“They work like machines. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. But we simply can’t afford to pay that kind of salary,” he said.
Separately, Yumadilov spoke about the work of street cleaners from Senegal. According to him, 31 citizens of that country have been working in Orenburg since April, and four more are expected to arrive in the near future.
The mayor said he is satisfied with their work, as they come to work even on weekends and tackle difficult tasks, such as cleaning up neglected areas near children’s camps.
According to Yumadilov, the Senegalese workers’ salary demands do not exceed those of Russian street cleaners, but they take on the hardest and dirtiest work.
He added that hiring foreign workers allows the city to save money that would otherwise have to be spent on services provided by contractors.
Earlier, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated that Ukraine’s strikes on Russian fuel infrastructure have already yielded tangible results. According to him, a country that for decades profited from oil and fuel exports is now forced to seek opportunities to import energy resources itself.
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin has supported the idea of creating a network of small oil refineries in the country to increase fuel supplies to the domestic market.
