Mobilization in Russia for Feb. 19-22, 2026 CIT Volunteer Summary
Army Recruitment
Recruiters continue aggressively pressuring students to sign contracts with Russia’s Ministry of Defense, ostensibly for service in the Unmanned Systems Forces.
Lobachevsky State University of Nizhny Novgorod targets students with three or more failing grades as potential candidates, offering them a military contract instead of academic expulsion. To drive this effort, the university has established a campaign commission involving the vice-rector, deans and military training center staff.
ITMO University in Saint Petersburg also encourages struggling students to take a one-year leave of absence to sign a contract.
Russian Technological University similarly focuses its recruitment efforts on underperforming students. Administrators summon such individuals to the educational department, where a dedicated recruitment office has now been established. Additionally, they deliberately deny struggling fourth-year students the opportunity to retake failed exams or otherwise clear their academic records to coerce them into signing a contract.
Meanwhile, Moscow Industrial College has set up a special recruitment office where recruiters invite students to test their skills on UAV simulators before handing them promotional brochures about serving in the Unmanned Systems Forces.
Students at Volgograd State Medical University are also being urged to join the Unmanned Systems Forces. The Dozor v Volgograde movement has published an audio recording of one such conversation with students, led by Vice-Rector for Youth Affairs Danil Lipov. Students are being offered the option to take academic leave and then resume their studies after completing their service under an individual plan, remaining with the same group. Activists report that six students across two cohorts have agreed so far, with the total number of recruits still "in the single digits."
At Tomsk State University of Architecture and Construction, military recruiters are holding outreach events, encouraging students to join the Unmanned Systems Forces.
The Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Khabarovsk region has issued guidelines on how to organize and conduct "informational and outreach activities" aimed at recruiting students from universities and vocational colleges into the Unmanned Systems Forces. Recruitment files are now being posted on social media even by secondary school institutions. The guidelines recommend including "servicemen with combat experience" in recruitment teams, while responsibility for the results of the campaign is to be assigned to officials no lower in rank than a vice-rector. These officials are required to submit monthly reports to the region’s operational headquarters.
In the Samara region, the payment for recruiting contract soldiers from other regions has been increased from 100,000 rubles [$1,300] to 500,000 rubles [$6,510]. The payment for recruiting residents of the region itself, however, remains unchanged at 100,000 rubles [$1,300].
In the city of Sterlitamak in Bashkortostan [Russia's constituent republic], authorities have introduced a payment of 400,000 rubles [$5,210] for helping recruit contract soldiers. The payments do not apply to those who persuade mobilized men or convicts to sign contracts.
The city administration of Perm has suspended its municipal payment of 100,000 rubles [$1,300] for signing a contract with the MoD. Officials say the decision was made back in October 2025 and that the funds were redirected "to other needs related to staffing the armed forces." Social support measures for war participants and their families remain in place.
In Krasnoyarsk, a man previously convicted of murder who raped his 64-year-old mother is reportedly set to be released from prosecution after signing a contract with the MoD.
According to the Idite Lesom! [Flee through the woods/Get lost you all] Telegram channel, a conscript with an archived draft notice from last September and a previously imposed travel ban was able to fly out of Sheremetyevo Airport in mid-February. At the time of departure, no active restrictions appeared in the system. After he left, he received a new notice for a data check.
Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts
Based on open sources, Mediazona [independent Russian media outlet] and BBC News Russian, together with volunteers, have verified the names of 186,102 Russian fighters killed in Ukraine. Over the past week, the list has grown by 8,669 names.
Fedot Tusumov, a member of the State Duma from the Russia's constituent Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), has stated that conscripts from Yakutia serving in military units in Russia's Far East are being coerced into signing contracts with the MoD after two months of service, through deception or moral pressure. Tusumov formally requested that the MoD, the Investigative Committee and the Chief Military Prosecutor’s Office, investigate the information he received from the mothers of the conscripts. Previously, families of conscripts from the Tyumen, Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk regions, as well as Russia's constituent Republic of Khakassia, who also ended up in military units in Russia's Far East, have reported the practice of coercion to sign a contract through pressure or deception. Some of them subsequently managed to have the contracts terminated.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
The Samara Garrison Military Court has terminated the criminal case against Lieutenant Colonel Sergey Ivanov, who was accused of indecent acts against his own daughter. At the time of the alleged crime in 2018, she was under 14 years old. Since Ivanov, after committing the alleged crimes, signed a contract with the MoD to join the war against Ukraine and received an award, the court released him from criminal liability. After his release, Ivanov assumed the role of military commissar for the Arsky and Atninsky districts of Russia's constituent Republic of Tatarstan.
The son of a deputy head of Federal Penitentiary Service in Kabardino-Balkaria [Russia’s constituent republic] and a participant in the war against Ukraine, Rustam Nogmov, has been sentenced to 15 years in a maximum security penal colony for the murder of a person known to the perpetrator to be in a helpless condition, committed with extreme brutality, from molester motives and involving abuse of the deceased’s body. On Jan. 30 of last year, in a public square in Nalchik, while under the influence of drugs, Nogmov attacked an 86-year-old pensioner, strangled her and desecrated her body.
In Saint Petersburg, the trial has begun of 20-year-old deserter Ruslan Timofeyev, who is charged with desertion and attempted murder of a law enforcement officer. On April 23, 2025, Timofeyev, who had fled his unit in Kamianka, was stopped for an identity check in the town of Kingisepp by police Lieutenant Dmitry Semyonovykh. Knowing he was wanted for leaving his unit, Timofeyev stabbed the officer in the neck and fled. He was detained and arrested the next day. From 2017 to 2021, Timofeyev was registered with the juvenile affairs commission and attended a closed-type special school after being placed there for assault and alcohol consumption. Medical records indicate that Timofeyev has schizoid personality disorder. He signed a contract during his period of statutory military service.
The Southern District Military Court has handed down sentences to four Ukrainian prisoners of war accused of participation in a terrorist organization and undergoing terrorist training. Servicemen of the Azov Brigade, 43-year-old Taras Koshman and 42-year-old Oleh Pavlenko, were sentenced to 18 years in a maximum security penal colony and six years in a general regime penal colony, respectively. Pavlenko was charged only with participation in a terrorist organization. Another Azov member, 36-year-old Artyom Kushakov, received 19 years in a maximum security penal colony, while Mykola Salo, a serviceman of the Aidar battalion, was sentenced to five and a half years in a general-regime penal colony. According to investigators, in August 2014 he "while in the Starobilsk district, voluntarily joined Aidar" and "took part in combat operations against the civilian population and the Russian Armed Forces on the territory of the Luhansk People’s Republic."
Police in Moscow detained a 19-year-old from Kostroma and a 17-year-old Moscow resident suspected of two attempted arson attacks in the early hours of Feb. 20. The first fire damaged a police vehicle but was quickly extinguished, and the 19-year-old was taken into custody. He faces charges including terrorism and attempted property damage. The second attack was allegedly planned near a police station, but the 17-year-old was detained after approaching a checkpoint with a canister of gasoline. Authorities have not yet decided whether to file charges against him. Investigators say the young men were acting on instructions from scammers posing as law enforcement officers who threatened them with criminal prosecution for "betraying the motherland." A 16-year-old college student was also detained in the capital after setting fire to a gas station pump.
In Orenburg, a 19-year-old from Voronezh was detained after allegedly setting fire to a police UAZ vehicle in the early hours of Feb. 20. In a video released by law enforcement officers, he said he had been manipulated by scammers posing as policemen. According to investigators, he was initially instructed to collect money from pensioners and hand it over to unidentified individuals. The scammers later told him to buy gasoline and set fire to a police vehicle parked outside a police building.
In the town of Topki in the Kemerovo region, a 21-year-old man was detained after setting fire on Feb. 20 to a traffic police vehicle outside a police building. He faces arson charges. Investigators say he transferred 43,000 rubles [$560] to scammers believed to be operating from abroad and, acting on their instructions, filmed himself carrying out the attack. He has been placed in a pretrial detention center.
The Zabaykalsky Regional Court has sentenced two teenagers, L. and T., who were 16 and 17 years old at the time of their detention, to seven and six and a half years in a juvenile correctional facility, respectively, in a case of an act of terror. L. was also found guilty of aiding terrorist activities. Previously, the prosecutor had requested eight and a half and nine years in a juvenile correctional facility for them. According to investigators, in June 2025, L. contacted an unknown individual from Ukraine via Telegram, who offered him payment to set fire to a forest. The teenager told his friend about the plan. Together they went to the forest and set fire to dry grass and pine needles. They never received the promised payment, and the damage caused by their actions was estimated at more than 300 million rubles [$3.90 million]. The teenagers did not plead guilty, and their parents reported torture during the investigation.
In the Stavropol region, the Federal Security Service (FSB) officers shot and killed a local resident during an attempt to detain him, described as "a member of a Ukrainian terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation," who was suspected of preparing an act of terror in the interests of Ukraine. According to the intelligence services, the man, located in Stavropol, was preparing an explosion for the Defender of the Fatherland Day [Feb. 23] "on the instructions of Kyiv intelligence services." To this end, he purchased explosive components, hid them in a stash, and on Feb. 19, attempted to retrieve them, but was stopped by law enforcement officers. During his arrest, he allegedly offered armed resistance and was killed. A month earlier, the FSB reported a murder during detention of a Kislovodsk resident who may have been involved in preparing an act of terror against a serviceman. Thus, at least 78 people have been killed during the FSB arrests since the beginning of the war.
In Moscow, Ivan Semenikhin, an employee of the Main Directorate of Criminal Investigation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, has been held in a pre-trial detention center on charges of high treason since February 2025. The specific accusations against Semenikhin are unknown. Previously, with the assistance of US and Serbian law enforcement agencies, he located a kidnapped seven-year-old boy from the Vladimir region. Human rights activists suggest that Semenikhin may have been charged with espionage or disclosure of state secrets due to contacts with foreigners.
Assistance
Authorities in the Kemerovo region have reduced compensation payments to the families of killed soldiers from 3 million rubles [$39,000] to 1 million rubles [$13,000]. The procedure for receiving assistance has not changed—each family member who submits an application is eligible for the payment.