As the first phase of Russia’s new “partial mobilization” got underway on Thursday, videos appeared on social media purporting to show newly mobilized men preparing to be deployed.
In the city of Neryungi — six time zones east of Ukraine — a community video channel posted clips of families saying goodbye to a large group of men, as they boarded buses. The video shows a woman crying and hugging her husband goodbye, while he reaches for his daughter’s hand from the bus window.
More men were shown in other videos apparently awaiting transport in the region of Yakutiya, a vast Siberian territory, and at Magadan Airport in the Russian far east. CNN has not been able independently to geolocate or date all the videos posted.
Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this week called for “partial mobilization” of Russia’s population to support the war in Ukraine, at a time when a sudden counteroffensive from Kyiv has recaptured thousands of square miles of territory and put Moscow on the backfoot. Experts say Russia’s forces have been significantly depleted.
The announcement would see 300,000 reservists called up, according to Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
In an early sign of how seriously Moscow is ramping up its efforts, the Human Rights Council of Russia has proposed that immigrants from central Asian countries who have had Russian citizenship for less than 10 years will undergo compulsory military service in Russia for a year.
“We are preparing proposals for new citizens of the Russian Federation who have Russian citizenship for less than 10 years to do compulsory military service for a year for people from Central Asian countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan,” council member Kirill Kabanov wrote on Telegram Thursday.
“Refusal to perform military duty should entail the deprivation of Russian citizenship not only for a person liable for military service, but also for members of his family,” he added.
Controversy in Russia
In his speech, Putin said those with military experience would be subject to conscription, and stressed that the accompanying decree — which was already signed — was necessary to “protect our homeland, its sovereignty and its territorial integrity.”
But the decree appears to allow for wider mobilization than he suggested in his speech. Ekaterina Schulmann, a Russian political scientist and associate fellow at the Chatham House think tank, said on Telegram that while the decree “describes the mobilization as partial,” it “sets no parameters of this partiality, either territorial or categoric.”
“According to this text, anyone can be called up except for those working in the military-industrial complex who are exempt for the period of their employment. The fact that the mobilization applies only to reservists or those with some particularly necessary skills is mentioned in the address, but not in the decree.”
Russian human rights lawyer Pavel Chikov said that the decree sets out mobilization “in the broadest terms.”
“The president is leaving it at the Defense Minister’s discretion. So in fact it is the Russian Defense Ministry that will decide who will be sent to war, from where and in what numbers,” Chikov said on Telegram.
Following the speech, at least 1,300 people were detained across Russia on Wednesday for participating in nationwide anti-war protests — with some directly conscripted into the military, according to a monitoring group, after leader Vladimir Putin announced a “partial mobilization” of citizens for his faltering invasion of Ukraine.
Images and videos show police cracking down on demonstrators in multiple cities,with footageshowing several protesters at a demonstration in central Moscow being carried away by the police and authorities in St. Petersburg attempting to contain a crowd chanting “no mobilization” outside Isakiivskiy Cathedral.