Mobilization in Russia for Feb. 6-9, 2025 CIT Volunteer Summary
Authorities and Legislation
Russia’s federal government has introduced three bills to the State Duma [lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia] that could significantly streamline the process for labeling an organization as extremist, the Kommersant daily newspaper reports. One of the bills proposes amending both the article on organizing extremist activities and the law on countering extremism. It would grant authorities the power to declare any group extremist—regardless of its format or membership size—based solely on a single conviction of one of its members. The bill authors have also proposed harsher penalties for inciting hatred or enmity if perpetrators "justify or promote violence or commit the act as a group." If lawmakers pass the bills, individuals could face criminal charges for such actions even without a prior administrative penalty for a similar offense.
The Ministry of Defense has completed the public consultation phase on amendments to the ministerial order regulating monthly social payments for those mobilized into military service. Under this order, mobilized soldiers receive a monthly payment of 158,000 rubles [$1,630] in addition to their base salary. The ministry now proposes withholding these payments from servicemen who go AWOL, face investigations for failing to execute orders, undergo disciplinary arrest or are detained on suspicion of committing a grave or aggravated crime, including evading service through self-inflicted injuries or feigned illness. Authorities will reinstate payments once these conditions are no longer met.
Vladimir Putin directed officials to consider mandatory genomic registration for soldiers and civilians going to war. Meanwhile, the federal government has proposed allocating 50 billion rubles [$515 million] to index pensions for military and law enforcement personnel. In line with an earlier instruction from Putin, it has introduced a bill in the State Duma that calls for a 9.5% pension increase for individuals who served in the Armed Forces, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rosgvardia [the Russian National Guard], the Federal Penitentiary Service and other security agencies. It has also proposed boosting the share of official pay recognized in pension calculations from 89.83% to 93.59%. Officials predict that after the increase, the average military pension will reach 40,800 rubles [$420] for normal discharge from service, 35,900 rubles [$370] for disability and 22,700 rubles [$230] for the families of the deceased.
Army Recruitment and Military Service Advertising
In Saint Petersburg, law enforcement officers conducted a roundup at a martial arts club. Police officers checked around fifty athletes, half of whom were foreigners. Twelve men who had recently obtained Russian citizenship were handed draft notices.
Adis Isakov, a criminal investigation officer from the city of Makhachkala accused of torture that led to the death of wrestling coach Kurban Dalgatov, has left for the war in Ukraine. Police detained 35-year-old Dalgatov in January 2023 as a witness to a dispute between two acquaintances, one of whom had shot the other in the leg. Law enforcement officers assaulted Dalgatov and tortured him with electric shocks for about ten minutes, leading to his death. Isakov was among 13 officers from the Sovetsky District police department accused of abuse and exceeding authority. Three of them have already left for the war.
Mobilized Soldiers, Volunteer Fighters and Contract Soldiers
A medical board of the MoD has confirmed the diagnosis of "paranoid schizophrenia" in Ruslan Derbichev, a contract soldier from Ingushetia [Russia’s constituent republic] who had been subjected to mistreatment. In the fall of 2024, Derbichev’s brother revealed that the 40-year-old, who suffers from schizophrenia, had been pressured into signing a contract. After being sent to the city of Rostov-on-Don for deployment to the frontline, Derbichev experienced a mental health crisis. As punishment, he was reportedly handcuffed and tied to a tree. Since mid-January, Derbichev had been undergoing examinations in the psychiatric department of a military hospital in the city of Volgograd. Following the assessment, doctors assigned him service fitness category D (unfit for military service) and prescribed further psychiatric monitoring and treatment.
War participant Vladimir Kazantsev, who lost a limb, was assigned civilian disability status instead of military disability. On July 1, 2024, he lost his leg. However, the Pension Fund issued him a disability certificate listing the cause not as a "military injury" but as "general illnesses." This decision deprived Kazantsev of all due payments and benefits and also prevented him from receiving a military pension.
Nikolay Storublinsky of the 85th Motorized Rifle Brigade, a soldier with a missing finger and an infected wound, was discharged from military hospital in Yeysk and sent back to his unit in an ambulance. Footage recorded by Storublinsky himself shows several other soldiers in the vehicle, one of whom has a drainage tube inserted in his abdomen. Storublinsky’s former wife told the Astra Telegram channel that he had spent just over a week in the hospital—admitted on Jan. 25 and taken away on Feb. 5, the day after his surgery. Storublinsky told Astra that he and four other soldiers were taken from the hospital by military police. He is currently in Pervomaisk (Sokolohirsk) in a medical unit, where he is only taken for bandage changes.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
Authorities in Perm have detained Rustam Altyrev, a 35-year-old previously convicted war veteran, on charges of murdering two people. After returning from Ukraine to the settlement of Severny Kommunar, Altyrev began regularly beating his girlfriend, causing her to flee to Perm. Seeking revenge, he killed her relatives—her 86-year-old grandmother and 53-year-old father. Altyrev was apprehended at a shopping center in Perm.
In Belgorod, three servicemen caused a traffic accident with an ambulance that resulted in two deaths. A BMW driven by one of the servicemen ran a red light at high speed, crashing into an ambulance that had the right of way. Two female paramedics were killed in the collision. The drivers of both vehicles and two BMW passengers were hospitalized with varying injuries. Preliminary reports indicate that the BMW driver was intoxicated at the time of the accident. According to the Pepel [Ashes] Telegram channel, Isa Abdurashidov was driving the BMW, with Murad Musaev among the passengers. The vehicle was registered to MMA trainer Ramazan Gadzhimuradov, who, according to the Baza Telegram channel, was also in the car. The Shot Telegram channel claims Gadzhimuradov was actually behind the wheel. The Agentstvo independent media outlet found that Gadzhimuradov had been involved in multiple car accidents.
At least three criminal cases related to sexual offenses, including against minors, were submitted to the Vladimir Garrison Military Court in 2024, discovered by the Dovod [independent Russian media outlet]. The names of the defendants are concealed in the court’s case files.
A court in Nalchik has sentenced 33-year-old war participant Arsen Bayev to seven years in a maximum-security penal colony for going AWOL. Bayev fled his unit in January 2024 and was detained in Kabardino-Balkaria [Russia’s constituent republic] at the end of August. His sentence took into account previous convictions. Between 2012 and 2019, Bayev had three convictions for theft and fraud. In 2020, he was sentenced to three and a half years in a penal colony for assaulting a passerby, and at the end of 2022, he was detained again, this time for vehicle theft. In February 2023, he was sentenced to two years in a maximum-security penal colony in the new case. From there, he was recruited for the war.
According to the VChK-OGPU Telegram channel, contract soldier Yevgeny Cherezov has been sentenced to five and a half years in a maximum-security penal colony for desertion. Cherezov unilaterally terminated his contract with the MoD and did not return to his unit after leave. He was detained in Novorossiysk several months later.
Contract soldier Ayk Aleksanyan has been sentenced to two and a half years in a penal colony on four counts of fraud. Wounded in action himself, Aleksanyan offered two fellow soldiers to expedite their entitled compensation of 3 million rubles [$30,900] for injuries sustained in combat—for a fee of 100,000 rubles [$1,030] each. Later, one of the soldiers and a third serviceman handed over an additional 300,000 rubles [$3,090] and 600,000 rubles [$6,180], as Aleksanyan promised to transfer them to a military police unit. Ultimately, he was convicted of fraud.
In Saint Petersburg, a 22-year-old student was detained after throwing a Molotov cocktail at the door of the local FSB office on the evening of Feb. 7. Following his arrest, the arsonist stated that he had acted under the instructions of phone scammers. According to Fontanka [pro-Russian media outlet of the Leningrad region], a criminal case has been initiated against the young man on charges of an act of terror.
On Feb. 8, in Chelyabinsk, a 59-year-old man attempted to set fire to the Department of Culture building, located next to a draft office. He threw a bottle with flammable liquid onto the porch, but no serious damage was caused. The arsonist was detained and stated that he had also been deceived by scammers.
A 24-year-old man has been detained in Novosibirsk. According to law enforcement officers, in February 2025, the detainee had been persuading a teenager via Telegram to commit an arson attack, promising a reward for setting fire to communication facilities. The court sent the man to a pre-trial detention center for two months.
The FSB has reported the detention of four women in Sevastopol, Voronezh and Rostov-on-Don, who, according to law enforcement, "as agents of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), were preparing acts of terror against high-ranking military officials and energy infrastructure facilities." According to the agency, the women were recruited by Ukrainian intelligence services in 2023 and underwent training in Ukraine. The detainee in Voronezh was allegedly preparing a "terrorist attack" against a high-ranking military official, those detained in Rostov-on-Don were targeting a local official, and the woman from Sevastopol had joined the BARS (Special Combat Army Reserve) volunteer unit while allegedly planning an attack on one of its fighters. The FSB claims the women confessed after their detention.
The FSB has reported the detention of a man accused of using social media to persuade Russian soldiers to defect to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. According to investigators, the 32-year-old "supporter of the Azov Battalion" was also gathering intelligence on Russian troop deployments, weaponry, personnel numbers and losses.
The Investigative Committee of Russia’s constituent Republic of Tatarstan has concluded its investigation into the criminal case of a 17-year-old boy charged with participation in a terrorist organization and treason. According to investigators, during the summer of 2023, when the accused was 15 or 16 years old, he established contact with representatives of a "Ukrainian terrorist organization." Following their instructions, he allegedly provided information about companies in Kazan in exchange for monetary compensation. The teenager was detained in the spring of 2024, and the case files have now been submitted to the court.
The Central District Military Court in the city of Yekaterinburg has sentenced Aleksey Grigoryev to 20 years in a maximum-security penal colony on charges of preparing a terrorist attack. According to investigators, Grigoryev cooperated with the Ukrainian Hochu Zhit [I Want to Live] project, planned to join the Freedom of Russia Legion and attempted to set fire to a relay cabinet in the Orenburg region to disrupt the supply of military vehicles. However, he ultimately abandoned his plans. Grigoryev claimed he was subjected to torture and coercion during interrogations at the Orenburg pre-trial detention center. His lawyer argued that his handler was an FSB officer who deliberately incited him to commit crimes. SOTAvision has published Grigoryev's final statement in court.
The 1st Western District Military Court has sentenced Ivan Kryukov to 11 years in a maximum-security penal colony on charges of participating in a terrorist organization. According to prosecutors, Kryukov applied to join the Freedom of Russia Legion and allegedly carried out two tasks: during the presidential election, he wrote "The Russian Volunteer Corps is nearby" on his ballot and sent his handlers photos and schematics of a power line.
A "court" in Sevastopol has sentenced 49-year-old Roman Grigoryan to 12 years in prison on treason charges. According to investigators, in 2023, he allegedly helped raise funds for purchasing unmanned maritime drones, UAVs and armored military vehicles for the AFU. Grigoryan was detained in 2024.
A court in Izhevsk has sentenced six men involved in the "Baymak case" to up to five years in a penal colony. The court sentenced Vilyur Karachurin and Aytugan Malabayev to five years in prison. Vilyur Karachurin and Aytugan Malabayev each received five-year sentences, while four other defendants—Fatikh Akhmetshin, Azat Mirzin, Danis Uzyanbaev and Vener Yaubasarov—were sentenced to four and a half years. All were found guilty under charges of participating in mass unrest and using non-dangerous violence against law enforcement officers.
Children and Educational System
On Feb. 6, the Kolosok kindergarten in the Udmurt village of Yershovka hosted a puppet show titled "Kolobok Joins the Army." The original fairy tale script was created for young preschool children in honor of Defenders of the Fatherland Day and was first published in 2019. The Govorit NeMoskva [NonMoscow Is Speaking] Telegram channel reported on other examples of militarization in schools across Russia.
On Jan. 28, Sergey Barbin, a member of the Storm-Z unit, spoke to students at Gymnasium No. 6 in the city of Shchyolkovo in the Moscow region. Barbin had previously been sentenced to 11 years in prison on drug-related charges. The educational institution did not disclose details of his military service or criminal record.
In Krasnoturinsk, Sverdlovsk region, a ceremonial awards event was held for children whose fathers went to war. According to the organizers, nearly 400 participants are involved in the "My dad is a hero" project. The town has a population of 55,000 residents.
Employees at a Moscow's university received a memo on how to properly communicate with students who have been to the war with Ukraine. The information was shared by a journalist from TV Rain [independent Russian television channel]. The memo states that "providing social, medical and psychological assistance is a top priority" and advises university staff to support war participants in "fulfilling their needs."
Longreads
The Vot Tak [Like This] media outlet has revealed that at least 10 former AFU soldiers are serving in the Russian battalion "named after Maksym Kryvonis," composed of Ukrainian prisoners of war. Forcing POWs to serve in the army of an enemy state is considered a war crime under the Third Geneva Convention.
During the first half of 2025, the Presidential Grants Foundation allocated more than 200 million rubles [$2.06 million] for projects related to patriotic education and military support.