This spring, Russia is calling up a record number of conscripts. Soldiers are being recruited even in the Ukrainian territories occupied by Russia. This is rarely done voluntarily, but mostly under pressure or due to a lack of alternative.
This spring, Russia called up the largest number of conscripts in the past 14 years. In late March, President Vladimir Putin issued a decree ordering a total of 160,000 men aged between 18 and 30 to join the army for a period of 12 months.
The Russian Defense Ministry claims that the call-up of conscripts, which takes place twice a year - in spring and autumn - – is common and has no connection to the war against Ukraine. However, men in the Russian-occupied regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson, which Moscow annexes and considers its territory, are also affected.
According to the Ukrainian human rights organization Eastern Human Rights Group, in the fall of 2024, at least 300 people from the occupied Ukrainian territories were drafted into the Russian army, of which about 200 from Zaporizhia and Kherson regions and 100 from Luhansk and Donetsk regions.
Without a Russian passport - no job, no mobile phones
“If they mobilize me by force, I will shoot myself”, says Oleksiy (name has been changed - ed.). The 21-year-old man lives in the Russian-occupied part of Zaporizhia region, where he wants to stay with his family. "I'll have to start my life over," he adds. Although Oleksiy already has a Russian passport, he has so far been spared military service. But since last fall, Russian occupation authorities have required men to register for military service as well, he says.
Without Russian documents, Oleksiy explains, it is almost impossible to find a job or study at a university. However, so far he has not heard of any cases of forced conscription. According to the 21-year-old, pro-Russian men voluntarily visit recruitment centers and sign contracts with the Russian army.
A similar picture is described by a 28-year-old resident of an occupied uninhabited area in the Luhansk region who has not yet received a Russian passport. According to him, the occupation authorities are making life difficult for people like him. Human rights activists confirm that without a Russian passport, one cannot obtain, for example, a SIM card, as mobile phone operators are under Russian control.
Military service for Ukrainians on Russian territory
Everyone who joins the Russian army is first sent for training in Russia, usually to barracks in the southern Russian regions of Rostov and Krasnodar, as well as near St. Petersburg or Moscow. Some men are sent to the annexed Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea.
According to Pavlo Lisyansky, a Ukrainian human rights activist and head of the Institute for Strategic Studies and Security, the Russian army does not yet have its own barracks in the occupied territories - mainly for security reasons.
“After completing their training, many conscripts are sent to the front, but before that they sign a contract with the Russian army,“ says Lisyansky. Usually this is not done voluntarily, but under pressure or due to a lack of alternatives, he adds. Some of the conscripts from the occupied Ukrainian territories use connections or bribes to secure service in the St. Petersburg or Moscow region, thus avoiding being sent to the front. According to Lisyansky, only 15 people managed to do this last year.
Soldiers for Russia from the “Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics“
A similar case was described in a Telegram channel: A man from the occupied part of the Donetsk region was sent to military service in the Krasnodar Territory. He was told that at the end of his service he would have to go to the front. The man wanted to seek help from the Russian military prosecutor's office, but his fate has been unknown since then, says the administrator of the channel in question, Mikhail (his name has been changed - ed.).
Not only people who have received a Russian passport and have reached the age of 18 are subject to compulsory military service, but also those who completed their military service in the so-called "Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics" before February 2022, i.e. before the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. According to Mikhail, this also includes members of the so-called "people's militias" of the self-proclaimed republics that existed from 2014 to 2022. In addition, men of military age in the aforementioned areas are directly called and summoned to the recruitment center to register or begin their military service.
What are the sanctions for refusing to serve?
It is practically impossible to refuse to serve in the Russian army, says Olya Skripnik of the Ukrainian “Crimean Human Rights Group“. According to her, Russia began illegally recruiting men into the army in 2015 - first in annexed Crimea, and then in other occupied regions of Ukraine. “Before the Russian occupation of Crimea, about 6,000 people were called up every year. We do not have current data, but the number has probably increased“, says Skripnik.
Refusal of military service in Russia can lead to two years in prison. According to human rights organizations, at least 583 criminal cases have been opened in Crimea alone. However, according to the Russian-language online publication “Verstka“, which is critical of the Kremlin, at least in the first half of 2024 none of those affected received a prison sentence - three were sentenced to probation, and the rest - to fines.
Human rights organizations speak of war crimes
However, the court decisions do not exempt anyone from serving in the Russian army, Skrypnyk specifies. According to the Ukrainian human rights activist, conscription into the army in the occupied territories violates international humanitarian law and constitutes a war crime.
Since 2022, Russia has been forcibly recruiting Ukrainians from the occupied territories into the army and often uses them as “human shields“: “We know of cases in which unarmed Ukrainian men were placed in front of the regular Russian army to be the first to be attacked by the enemy. This was practiced en masse in 2022“, says Skrypnyk.
According to the “Crimean Human Rights Group“ During its invasion of Ukraine, Russia used numerous conscripts from annexed Crimea. According to Skrypnik, at least 1,873 of them have been killed since 2022, and 116 Crimeans fighting for Russia have been captured by Ukrainian forces.