Mobilization in Russia for Dec. 7-9, 2025 CIT Volunteer Summary
Authorities and Legislation
Putin has signed a decree calling up reservists to undergo military training in 2026. The document comes into effect on the day of its publication. The organization of the training is the responsibility of the Russian government and regional authorities. Based on the decree, the Ministry of Defense prepares a directive and sends it to regional draft offices, which then issue draft notices to reservists. Under Russian law, such training cannot exceed two consecutive months. Putin signs a similar document every year, and traditionally some provisions are classified under the designation "for official use." In particular, the number of reservists to be called up for training has not been disclosed. Additionally, as suggested by the Voyennye Advokaty [Military Lawyers] Telegram channel, information about calling up reservists who sign a special contract to remain in the reserve may also be classified in the document.
Members of the State Duma [lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia], together with the government, are considering the possibility of granting a draft deferral from military service or alternative service for graduates of secondary vocational education institutions. Previously, Putin instructed the government and the MoD to prepare proposals for a special procedure for military service for this category of graduates. Currently, the law does not provide a draft deferral for vocational college graduates who continue their studies in a bachelor’s or specialist program, and later in a master’s program. Such a deferral is granted only if a young man enters university directly after high school or completes his college education before turning 18. Vocational college studies typically conclude at the end of June. As a result, adult graduates may be conscripted and sent to the army during the remaining 15 days of summer.
The State Duma has passed a bill in its third reading extending loan repayment holidays through 2026 for participants in the invasion of Ukraine. The measure applies to contract soldiers and personnel from various security agencies who signed loan agreements "before the day of participation in the special military operation," as well as volunteer fighters, mobilized soldiers and National Guard troops who took out loans prior to the start of their service or mobilization. The legislation also covers their family members. Depending on the category of servicemember, creditors must grant a repayment deferral for the duration of mobilization, the contract term or the period of participation in the war plus an additional 180 days. The independent Russian media outlet Mediazona estimates that banks have processed nearly 658,000 deferral applications since September 2022, totaling roughly 300 billion rubles [$4 billion].
In a single session, the State Duma passed in its second and third readings a bill that grants authorities the right to impose fines year-round on individuals who fail to notify a draft office of a change of residence lasting more than three months. By removing the phrase "during the draft period" from the statute, lawmakers expanded the scope of the penalty that had previously applied only during the regular spring and fall conscription campaigns. As distinct draft cycles are set to disappear next year under legislation introducing year-round conscription, authorities will impose fines for this violation throughout the year once the law takes effect. At present, these fines range from 10,000 to 20,000 rubles [$130-$260].
Army Recruitment
Rafis Khuzin, a resident of the Beryozovsky town in the Sverdlovsk region who was accused of murdering his wife, has been released from pre-trial detention to go to war before the court issues a verdict. The crime occurred on Oct. 17, when an argument erupted between the spouses over dinner preparation. During the confrontation, the drunk Khuzin grabbed a knife and stabbed his wife to death. He then cut off her skin and attempted to dismember the body but failed. One week later, Khuzin turned himself in to the police.
Russian citizens deported from the United States have been summoned to draft offices upon landing in Moscow. FSB employees detained the 64 deportees for several hours at the airport and did not return their documents during that time. Afterwards, all deported men were issued military summonses.
Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts
The Russian MoD has proposed establishing a new medal "For the Search of the Missing and the Fallen." According to the draft order, the award would be given to servicemen and other individuals "for significant assistance in carrying out these tasks."
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
Over the nearly four years of Russia’s war against Ukraine, veterans returning from the front have killed or injured more than 1,000 people. Of these, 274 were killed outright, another 163 died after sustaining severe bodily injuries, and the rest died in traffic accidents or as a result of other crimes. More than half of the deaths were caused by former convicts: among 281 previously convicted servicemen, at least 142 had served time in penal colonies for similar offenses. Another 465 people were seriously harmed by participants in the war, with ex-convicts again responsible for over half of the cases. Most incidents stemmed from domestic conflicts, about half of which involved alcohol or drugs, and the victims were most often the offenders’ own relatives and acquaintances. According to more than 700 published court rulings, judges considered the defendants’ participation in the war a mitigating factor in over 90% of cases.
According to calculations by Novaya Gazeta Europe [European edition of the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta], Russian courts have issued 8,000 sentences against former and active participants in the war under “civilian” criminal statutes (excluding AWOL, desertion and similar military offenses). About 7,000 of these verdicts were handed down by courts of general jurisdiction—that is, against veterans already discharged from the military. Another 1,000 sentences were issued by military courts, which handle cases involving active-duty servicemen. If official data is accurate, 137,000 servicemen had returned home from the frontline by the end of June, according to the presidential administration. This means that roughly 5% of those who returned have already been convicted of criminal offenses. More than 900 people were convicted of violent crimes such as murder or assault; about 3,000 for theft, vehicle theft and other property-related offenses; 1,800 for traffic violations; 1,500 for drug offenses; and nearly 400 for fraud.
The Southern District Military Court has delivered its verdict in the murder case of American pro-Russian propagandist Russell Bentley. Servicemen of the 5th Motorized Rifle Brigade—Vitaly Vansyatsky, Andrey Iordanov and Vladislav Agaltsev—were found guilty of exceeding their authority and using torture that resulted in death. Iordanov was also convicted of escaping custody, while another serviceman, Vladimir Bazhin, was found guilty of concealing a grave crime. Vansyatsky and Iordanov were each sentenced to 12 years in a maximum security penal colony, Agaltsev to 11 years and Bazhin to a year and a half in a penal settlement. Bentley, 63, had been fighting on the side of pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine since 2014 and later worked for the Sputnik propaganda outlet. He disappeared on April 8, 2024, in Donetsk. According to investigators, that day Vansyatsky, Agaltsev and Iordanov found Bentley "preparing to film the aftermath of a missile strike" and "reported to their unit command that they had identified a saboteur." The man was placed in a vehicle with a bag over his head, assaulted and tortured, causing his death. That same day, Vansyatsky and Agaltsev blew up the vehicle containing Bentley's body. The following day, Bazhin moved the remains. The Astra Telegram channel published its own investigation into the American's death. According to journalists, Bentley was killed on the grounds of the abandoned Petrovskaya mine in Donetsk, where the command of the 5th and 110th brigades had set up a torture basement for refuseniks and servicemen who had fallen out of favor.
In the Krasnodar region, war participant Igor Volosevich has been threatening relatives of Aleksandr Shabanov, an anti-war activist who emigrated to France. On Nov. 29, in the town of Kropotkin, Volosevich—Shabanov's former colleague at the locomotive depot—came to a beer store that the activist and former train driver had left to his wife's parents. There, he issued threats, declaring that if Shabanov returned to Russia, he would break his arms and legs and that Shabanov "would not survive three days." He also threatened the activist’s parents and claimed he could force the shop to close. Shabanov said the conflict with Volosevich has been ongoing for years. According to him, Volosevich repeatedly filed police reports against him—both over workplace matters and after Shabanov began publicly expressing his anti-war stance. In 2022, Shabanov quit his job after refusing to operate trains marked with the letters "Z" and "V," symbols of Russia’s war, and opened a beer shop. Following threats and pressure from authorities and police, he and his family fled to France, where he sought asylum.
In Crimea, a criminal case into the assault of a female war participant has been opened following a collective appeal by State Duma deputies. In the fall of 2024, servicewoman Yevgenia met a serviceman who told her he could help her with paperwork to receive payments for her injuries. They began a relationship and moved in together, but the man soon became abusive, stealing money from her bank card and exhibiting violent jealousy. In the early hours of Dec. 31, 2024, while intoxicated, he beat her until she lost consciousness, breaking 12 ribs. Her son’s calls to police produced no response. The man kept her confined at home without medical care for more than a month, and she was freed only in February, when he left for a business trip to Moscow. Subsequent complaints to the police and prosecutor’s office were ignored. The case moved forward only eight months later and only after her lawyer appealed to the State Duma.
The Kansk City Court has rejected a local resident's lawsuit against the draft board, which had previously denied him permission to substitute compulsory military service with alternative civilian service. The young man, an Evangelical Christian Baptist, cited Article 59 of the Russian Constitution and argued that his religious beliefs prevented him from bearing arms or taking the military oath. The draft office dismissed these arguments, stating that his application had been filed too late and that he had not provided sufficient evidence of the sincerity of his faith. The court agreed, ruling that he failed to demonstrate that his beliefs and lifestyle created an insurmountable conflict with military service, and therefore dismissed his claim.
A 13-year-old schoolboy suspected of setting a mosque on fire has been detained in Tolyatti. According to investigators, the teenager set the mosque on fire on Dec. 8 for a reward of 80,000 rubles [$1,040], following instructions from a "Ukrainian handler." The student is under the age of criminal responsibility.
The Federal Security Service (FSB) has detained a 21-year-old resident of the Rostov region suspected of committing an act of terror and treason. Intelligence services believe the detainee acted on orders received from an SBU [the Security Service of Ukraine] officer via Telegram and, in exchange for a promise of a monetary reward, set fire to a cell tower's thermo cabinet. The young man has been sent to a pre-trial detention center.
The Central District Military Court has sentenced Andriy Lazarenko, a 55‑year‑old native of Mariupol who holds both Ukrainian and Russian citizenship, to 18 years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of attempted terrorist attack and treason. Prosecutors had sought a 25‑year sentence. Lazarenko had lived his entire life in Mariupol and did not evacuate after Russia’s full‑scale invasion. In the summer of 2022, he helped four women leave the Russian‑occupied city, but when he returned he was barred from re‑entering Mariupol and taken instead to Donetsk, then Taganrog, and ultimately to Russia’s constituent Republic of Mordovia. There, in November 2022, he was forced to accept Russian citizenship and was unsuccessfully pressured to join the Russian army. According to prosecutors, Lazarenko opposed the war and contacted representatives of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in September 2023, who allegedly offered him money to set fire to a draft office in Mordovia. He was detained on Oct. 15 before the arson took place. Investigators claim he was arrested at the scene of the planned attack, while Lazarenko says he was detained at his home. He was taken to a detention facility where, according to his account, he was threatened with rape and forced to sign roughly 20 blank sheets of paper. A source cited by Mediazona said Lazarenko may have been set up by an acquaintance, Yury Kravchenko, who allegedly recorded their conversations in exchange for Russian citizenship and conducted correspondence with the AFU on Lazarenko’s behalf.
Valeriya Marchenko, convicted of attempting to set fire to a draft office, has had her sentence increased to 21 years. In June, the poultry‑farm worker from the village of Reftinsky in Russia’s Sverdlovsk region was sentenced to 20 years in a general‑regime penal colony on charges of preparing an act of terror, treason and undergoing training for terrorist activity. An appeals court later reclassified the treason charge from "attempted" to "completed," adding an additional year to her sentence. In early December, Yekaterinburg’s Channel 4 aired a "documentary" about Marchenko’s case produced with the participation of the FSB. The film includes surveillance footage from a hotel room showing Marchenko assembling Molotov cocktails—material that suggests she may have been the target of a law‑enforcement provocation.
The Southern District Military Court has handed down sentences to three Ukrainian prisoners of war, finding them guilty of participating in a terrorist organization and undergoing terrorist training. Maksym Cherednichenko, a serviceman of the Azov Brigade, was sentenced to 18 years in a penal colony. He had previously received a 26-year sentence for allegedly carrying out attacks on residential areas. Another Azov fighter, 28-year-old Serhiy Spanchek, received 18 years in a maximum security penal colony, while 44-year-old Bohdan Haviada from the Aidar Battalion was sentenced to 17 years in a maximum security penal colony.
The "Supreme Court of the DPR" has sentenced 28-year-old Estonian citizen Herman Barinov to 14 years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of mercenarism. According to investigators, Barinov fought on Ukraine’s side and, before January 2024, received a salary of 1.6 million rubles [$20,800] for his service in the International Legion of Ukraine’s Territorial Defense Forces.
Assistance
In the Sverdlovsk region, authorities will begin paying disability pensions to mercenaries who fought in the Donbas starting May 11, 2014. According to the regional office of the Russian Social Fund, these payments will be available to "members of private military companies and other organizations who became disabled while supporting the Russian Armed Forces."
In Russia’s constituent Republic of Tatarstan, lawmakers are considering introducing employment quotas for participants in the war in Ukraine. Under the draft law, companies with more than 200 employees would be required to reserve 1% of their average workforce for veterans. The measure would affect approximately 875 employers.
Children and Militarization
For the third consecutive week, events related to the war in Ukraine have been widely held in Russian schools. Since Nov. 27, students have been forced to make gifts for "participants of the special military operation" as part of events for the International Volunteer Day (Dec. 5). Ahead of the Day of Heroes of the Fatherland (Dec. 9), schools also began holding meetings with veterans of the war in Ukraine and lectures on military topics.
The Avangard Center for Military-Patriotic Education of Youth conducted a "Military-Patriotic Dictation" among school and university students. This year, according to the organizers, 60,000 school students took part in the in-person stage alone, and more than 800,000 people have participated in the campaign over its three years of existence. The dictation consists of 25 questions, with at least 30 variants of questions related to the war against Ukraine.
Longreads
Astra tells the story of Melekine, a resort village near Mariupol, where a basement for military refuseniks from Buryatia [Russia's constituent republic] is located a few hundred meters from a holiday guesthouse. Detainees are held there for months, with the goal of coercing them into signing voluntary consent to take part in assaults.
Mediazona reports on how Russian soldiers return on leave, kill Russian civilians and then go back to service—often without facing any punishment.
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has gathered information about 31-year-old contract soldier Sergey Yagushev, who returned from Ukrainian captivity in June, then shot seven fellow soldiers and fled on Nov. 25. He has still not been found.