Mobilization in Russia for Jan. 7-11, 2026 CIT Volunteer Summary
Army Recruitment
In the Irkutsk region, authorities more than doubled the sign-up bonus for military contracts in January, increasing it from 1 million rubles [$12,600] set in March 2025 to 2.4 million rubles [$30,300]. The federal government pays an additional 400,000 rubles [$5,040], and advertisements distributed by regional officials now promise contract soldiers 5.32 million rubles [$67,100] for the first year of service. As of summer 2025, the region ranked last in the Siberian Federal District for recruiting volunteer fighters, while authorities had to cut healthcare spending to address a budget deficit.
The human rights organization Shkola Prizyvnika [Conscript School] reports that military officials continue to coerce conscripts into signing contracts with the Ministry of Defense, noting that the group received 12 related complaints in just one month. In a unit near Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, previously cited for abusing conscripts, an officer demanded volunteers for contract enlistment. When no one stepped forward, he applied physical pressure and eventually organized a "lottery," in which soldiers drew contract documents until one "lost" by selecting an agreement signed by an unknown party. Although the unit commander tore up the contract after discovering the scheme, relatives say the intimidation resumed shortly thereafter, ultimately driving one conscript to enlist. Meanwhile, in a separate incident in the Voronezh region, a conscript who had served for about three months signed a contract following constant psychological pressure.
The authorities of the Vladimir region have begun recruiting for the mobilization manpower reserve. Mobile fire teams are being formed to protect strategic facilities. After signing a contract, a reservist will be sent for training, then called up for military training and assigned to guard specific critical infrastructure sites, according to the regional military commissar, Yury Gusarov. For their service, contract soldiers will receive 5,000-10,000 rubles [$63-130] per month outside of training periods, and 38,000-45,000 rubles [$480-570] during training. Reservists are also promised additional payments from the factories they protect, amounting to around 100,000 rubles [$1,260] or more. Which factories will be guarded has not been specified. So far, the creation of units to protect important facilities from drones has been announced in at least 20 regions. At the end of 2025, Vladimir Putin issued a decree on holding training in 2026 for individuals enrolled in the mobilization manpower reserve. The number of people to be called up is classified as "for official use only."
Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts
Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, at least 19 Russian generals have been killed, according to open data and reports from Russian and Ukrainian sources reviewed by The Insider [independent Russian investigative media outlet]. Losses among the general staff were recorded both directly on the frontline—where several senior officers were killed by sniper fire or artillery strikes in the first months of the war—and in the rear, including as a result of strikes on headquarters, aviation incidents, acts of sabotage and explosions inside Russia. Some of those killed were retired at the time of their death or were serving in volunteer and assault units, including Storm-Z and the Wagner Group.
A 19-year-old conscript from Russia’s constituent Republic of Dagestan has lost his memory after suffering a severe head injury in an assault at a military unit in the Voronezh region. He initially served in Naro-Fominsk and was later transferred to the Voronezh region. There, according to an official, he was brutally beaten, resulting in a fractured skull. The official account, however, claims he fell from a tower. The young man is currently undergoing treatment at a neurosurgery medical center in Moscow.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
The Odintsovo Garrison Military Court has sentenced Kirill Sidorov, a rifleman and radio operator with the 177th Naval Infantry Regiment, to 11.5 years in a special-regime penal colony on charges of armed robbery and going AWOL. According to the verdict, Sidorov fled the Vishnevsky Central Military Hospital in Krasnogorsk, where he had been receiving treatment. Late at night, the marine attempted to rob a truck driver at a Wildberries [the largest Russian online retailer] pickup-point parking lot using a kitchen knife, but the driver resisted. Less than an hour later, at the parking lot of another Wildberries pickup point, Sidorov again attempted to rob a man unloading goods and stabbed him in the stomach. He took a backpack from the victim’s car containing a wallet with cash. Sidorov was later detained. Sidorov has at least three prior criminal convictions. In 2014, he was sentenced to nine years in prison for large-scale drug trafficking. In September 2024, he received a one-year suspended sentence for making death threats, and in January 2025 he was sentenced to one year in a maximum security penal colony for bank card theft. He did not serve that sentence and instead signed a contract with the MoD in February 2025. Since mid-July, he had been undergoing treatment for a wound at a military hospital outside Moscow.
In Russian-annexed Crimea, Dmitry Popov, a 21-year-old serviceman from Tolyatti, Samara region, has been detained on suspicion of murdering a 17-year-old girl in the Dzhankoi district. Elvina Kravchenko, a resident of the village of Maryino, went missing on Jan. 4. According to her relatives, she told them she was going to visit her father in a neighboring village. In reality, she went on a date with a young man she had met online that same day. The Rossiyskaya Gazeta [Russian Newspaper] media outlet claims that Kravchenko met a guy from a neighboring village who offered her a ride in a minivan. However, the media outlet omitted the fact that he was a Russian serviceman. During their date, an argument broke out. Popov strangled the girl and then tried to burn her body to conceal the crime. He is currently in a pre-trial detention center in the city of Simferopol. It is unknown exactly when he signed a contract with the MoD to participate in the war in Ukraine. Popov has been posting videos from the frontline since April 2025.
Assistance
In Russia’s constituent Republic of Tatarstan, 3,200 war participants have received prosthetics, wheelchairs and other rehabilitation aids from the Defenders of the Fatherland Fund over two years. According to Aleksey Vovchenko, the Deputy Minister of Labor of the Russian Federation, more than half of wounded soldiers have undergone amputations, with approximately 80 percent losing their lower limbs and 20 percent losing their upper limbs. Federal spending on technical rehabilitation aids has more than doubled compared to the pre-war period, rising from 37.3 billion rubles [$470 million] in 2022 to 75.4 billion rubles [$950 million] in 2025. For 2026, 98.16 billion rubles [$1 billion] has been allocated to provide rehabilitation support to disabled individuals.
In 2026, military personnel will be able to apply to participate in the Time of Heroes personnel program and even pass the selection process, but they will begin training only after demobilization, injury or the expiration of their contracts. According to a source cited by the Vyorstka media outlet, the changes are intended to prevent soldiers from applying for leave in order to attend training. For now, the plan applies to the national program, but the official noted that regional programs are expected to follow suit.
Longreads
The Idel.Realii [part of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty] online media outlet analyzed data on soldiers killed in the war who were natives of Republic of Tatarstan. The analysis found that large urban centers—Kazan and Naberezhnye Chelny—have been relatively lightly affected by casualties, while rural areas and small towns bear the brunt of the war. The risk of being killed for a resident of an agricultural district is four to five times higher than for a resident of Kazan.
The Sibir.Realii [part of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty] online media outlet reports on how residents of Tuva, one of Russia’s poorest regions, end up fighting in the war.
