Mobilization in Russia for July 16-19, 2026 CIT Volunteer Summary
Authorities and Legislation
The government introduced a bill in the State Duma [lower house of Russia's Federal Assembly] to expand the list of convicts who can sign a contract with the Ministry of Defense during mobilization, martial law, or wartime. The bill would lift restrictions for those convicted under several articles of Russia's Criminal Code covering smuggling, participation in a gang or criminal community, illegal interference with the operation of critically important facilities, illegal handling of nuclear materials, organizing illegal migration, and losing documents containing state secrets. The ban on signing a contract would remain for those convicted of terrorism, sabotage, treason, espionage, and sexual crimes against minors. The changes amend a law adopted in 2024. Even so, known cases (1, 2) show that the law has been violated in practice, including by people who committed sexual crimes against minors and then signed contracts with the MoD.
Russia's Education Ministry has prepared a draft order splitting the school subject "Fundamentals of Security and Defense of the Motherland" into two mandatory courses—"Life Safety" and "Basic Military Training." According to the document, each course will be allotted 34 academic hours, and Basic Military Training will cover the fundamentals of military service, drill training, general military regulations, and practical exercises. The order will take effect on Sept. 1, 2026, and will apply to students entering the eighth and tenth grades.
Army Recruitment
The MoD reported that it had completed the spring dispatch of conscripts to military units. According to the ministry, from April 1 to July 15 it sent 141,000 people into the armed forces. In total, it plans to conscript 261,000 people for mandatory military service in 2026. For comparison, 295,000 people were called up in 2025, 283,000 in 2024, and 277,000 in 2023.
Russian Deputy Defense Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov stated that more than 140,000 servicemen have completed training in reserve regiments and at training ranges since the beginning of 2026. According to him, for the first time, as many as 107 commanders of assault units were brought in to train personnel. Another Deputy Defense Minister, Alexey Krivoruchko, said that during the first six months of the year more than 8,000 specialists had been trained for the Unmanned Systems Forces. He also announced the establishment of a unified training system for both personnel and units of the drone forces.
According to TV Rain [independent Russian television channel], businesses in Buryatia [Russia's constituent republic] are failing to meet government-imposed recruitment targets for sending employees to the war. A source cited by the outlet said that in June, companies in the Muysky Municipal District sent only one employee to the frontline instead of the planned 24. As a result, the district's July quota was increased to 30 people to make up for the shortfall. The district's recruitment target for the entire year stands at 61 people, up from 37 last year. Even then, however, only 13 people ultimately signed military contracts. Earlier, TV Rain reported that regional authorities have been assigning business’ quotas for sending employees to the frontline and encouraging them to sign agreements to recruit contract soldiers. Under the scheme, companies receive 100,000 rubles [$1,280] for each person they recruit.
Authorities in the Rostov region have introduced a 400,000-ruble [$5,130] sign-up bonus for convicts who sign military contracts with the MoD, regardless of their citizenship. For most other categories of recruits, the region has offered a 3 million-ruble [$38,500] sign-up bonus since March.
At migration departments within police stations in the Krasnodar region, men are required to sign an acknowledgement confirming receipt of military recruitment materials before being issued a passport. According to one employee, the signature is intended to let the draft office know that information about military contract terms was provided by the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The leaflet lists payments for signing a military contract and participating in the war, as well as bonuses for offensive operations, destroying enemy equipment, and the advance of assault units. Separate sections outline compensation for combat injuries and payments to the families of those killed in action.
Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts
BBC, in collaboration with Mediazona [independent Russian media outlet] and a team of volunteers, has identified the names of 233,199 Russian servicemen killed since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, based on open-source data. Over the week since the previous update, the list grew by 166 names.
A resident of the Tula region was allegedly deceived into joining a UAV unit and then sent on an assault mission. According to his wife, the man traveled to Tula to apply for a job, where he was offered a position with a local military repair battalion. However, while completing the paperwork, the terms reportedly changed: he was asked to sign documents assigning him to the Polite People volunteer unit. Recruiters allegedly assured him that the unit did not fight on the frontline and was engaged "exclusively in UAV operations" in the Southern Military District. The man ultimately signed a contract as a UAV operator and was sent to Luhansk. Once there, he reportedly had to purchase two quadcopters with his own money. On the evening of April 29, he called his father and said he was being sent on an assault mission. He has been listed as missing in action near Reznykivka since May 2. According to his wife, several other women whose husbands ended up in the same unit have also complained about the recruiter's actions.
A 47-year-old contract soldier from the Stavropol region was reportedly returned to the frontline after being wounded without first undergoing a military medical board evaluation, where he sustained another injury. The man, who signed a military contract in 2023, was deployed to the Donetsk region, where he suffered wounds to his chest and limbs. In 2024, while on medical leave, he attempted to seek treatment at military medical facilities, but his command ordered him to return to service and later declared him AWOL. In September 2025, he was assigned Group III disability status, while the Investigative Committee declined to open a criminal case. When he later visited a military commandant's office, he discovered that his unit had never removed him from the wanted list. He was subsequently assigned to the unit's reserve battalion, where he was promised medical treatment. Instead, he was returned to the frontline without undergoing a military medical board evaluation, was wounded again, and was then transferred to a new unit.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
In Saint Petersburg, Aleksandr Bazhimov, a former military commissar of the Vyborg district, has been detained on charges of receiving an especially large bribe. In late May, a court sent him to a pre-trial detention center. According to investigators, in November 2024, he arranged fictitious employment at a state-funded institution in Saint Petersburg for at least 50 people who had signed contracts with the Ministry of Defense. Investigators allege that such schemes allowed organizations to maintain staffing levels, receive compensation for sign-up bonuses for contract soldiers, and benefit from tax incentives. For each contract soldier processed, the enterprise allegedly paid 10,000 rubles [$130], with the total alleged bribe amounting to 500,000 rubles [$6,410]. The criminal case was initiated based on the testimony of Dmitry Antonov, the CEO of the Yastreb PMC.
In the occupied Donetsk region of Ukraine, the Russian-appointed "Yenakiieve Interdistrict Court" has sentenced A. V. Aralkin, a former war participant, to two years in a maximum security penal colony for abuse of authority involving torture. According to investigators, Aralkin began working for the State Inspectorate for Road Traffic Safety in May 2023. On June 14, 2025, he pursued a minor who was driving without a license and attempted to flee. After detaining the teenager, Aralkin knocked him to the ground and physically assaulted him. The court imposed a sentence below the statutory minimum because the defendant reached a pretrial agreement and testified against a colleague involved in the assault.
The Southern District Military Court has sentenced 34-year-old Ukrainian prisoner of war Dmytro Zhitnyk to 19 years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of participating in a terrorist community and undergoing training to carry out terrorist activities. According to investigators, Zhitnyk joined the Azov Brigade in 2017 and served as a senior instructor with the rank of warrant officer. In May 2022, he was taken prisoner in the city of Mariupol during the defense of the Azovstal Steel Factory.
In Balashikha, Moscow region, a 15-year-old schoolgirl has been detained on charges of attempted property destruction and an attempted terrorist attack. According to investigators, the girl tried to set fire to a fuel storage tank at a local gas station but was stopped by station employees. Law enforcement officials claim she was acting on the instructions of an unidentified individual who contacted her through a messaging app, where he allegedly exerted psychological pressure and threatened her.
In Saint Petersburg, a 16-year-old teenager has been detained in connection with a terrorist attack. According to investigators, the youth set fire to a gas pump at a petrol station, completely destroying the pump and damaging the fueling module. Investigators claim the teenager committed the act under the influence of phone scammers who posed as "members of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" and threatened him.
The Tsentralny District Court in Chelyabinsk has ordered a 17-year-old teenager into pre-trial detention center on charges of attempted act of terror. According to investigators, in the early hours of July 15, he entered the grounds of the Chelyabinsk police department and allegedly attempted to set fire to a police-issued Niva vehicle but was stopped by law enforcement officers.
Moscow's Presnensky District Court has ordered the arrest of 20-year-old Kostroma student Aleksandr Stefanovich in connection with a terrorism case. According to his mother, Stefanovich was detained on Feb. 18. Video from his interrogation shows that he met a young woman online who sent him a link. After he clicked it, a webpage appeared claiming that his personal data had been leaked. He was then contacted by a man claiming to be a law enforcement officer, who allegedly convinced him that he faced criminal prosecution for "transferring data to Ukraine." Investigators say he was subsequently coerced into setting fire to a police vehicle. Another young man was detained at the same time. He also allegedly attempted to set fire to a police car but changed his mind at the last moment and went to a police station to confess. His name has not been disclosed, and his case has been separated into a different proceeding.
Moscow's Zamoskvoretsky District Court has remanded two 21-year-old Algerian students to a pre-trial detention center on charges of terrorist attack allegedly committed in a group in conspiracy. According to investigators, one of the students was contacted through a messaging app by an unidentified person who offered him $300 to set fire to transportation infrastructure. The student allegedly agreed and recruited an acquaintance. In May 2026, they set fire to three railway relay cabinets. Investigators say they recorded themselves carrying out the attack on video.
In Sevastopol, FSB officers detained a 57-year-old native of Ukraine’s Vinnytsia region on charges of illegally acquiring and storing explosive devices, illegally manufacturing explosive devices, preparing a terrorist attack and terrorist training. According to the agency, in the summer of 2025 the man built an improvised explosive device and planned to detonate it at a monument marking the 300th anniversary of the Russian Navy in Sevastopol.
The FSB reported detaining two women with Russian citizenship in Crimea on suspicion of high treason. According to the agency, one of the detainees, a 59-year-old Yalta resident and native of the Mykolaiv region, met an SBU [Security Service of Ukraine] officer in Kyiv and subsequently carried out assignments in Crimea on his instructions. She set up a cache containing components for an improvised explosive device and passed the coordinates to the Ukrainian side. The cache was later used by the SBU to organize the bombing of a car belonging to Capt. 1st Rank Valery Trankovsky in Sevastopol in November 2024. The officer was killed in the explosion. The second detainee, a 34-year-old Crimea resident, allegedly sent 5,000 hryvnias from a Ukrainian bank account to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. She also collected information on fuel and energy infrastructure, a military airfield and other military facilities in Crimea, according to the FSB. She had intended to pass the information to a relative who serves in Ukraine’s State Border Guard Service but was detained before sending it.
Moscow’s Meshchansky District Court ordered the arrest of Maksim Kravchuk, 35, a scientist from Shchyolkovo outside Moscow, on charges of high treason. Details of the case have not been disclosed. Kravchuk is an aerodynamics specialist. According to the Ostorozhno Novosti [Beware the News] Telegram channel, he worked at TsNIIMash, a rocket and space research institute in Moscow that operates under Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency. The Agentstvo [Agency] independent outlet reported that between 2016 and 2019 the scientist visited Ukraine twice.
The Krasnodar Regional Court has sentenced a resident of the Smolensk region named Bogdan to 15 and a half years in a maximum security penal colony in a high treason case. According to investigators, in the winter of 2024, he offered assistance to a person he believed to be a representative of the SBU, and then transmitted information to him regarding the draft office of Anapa and industrial infrastructure facilities in Novorossiysk. According to claims made in court, the person he was actually communicating with was an officer of the FSB directorate for the Stavropol region.
The Khabarovsk Regional Court has increased the sentence of the former deputy chairman of the Khabarovsk branch of the Red Cross, Aleksey Detychev, raising the term from four and a half to 14 years in a maximum security penal colony after reclassifying the charge from "confidential" cooperation with foreigners to high treason. According to investigators, in exchange for political asylum in the UK, Detychev agreed to transmit information that could be used against the security of Russia, and also offered to conduct anti-Russian propaganda among the youth and collected information on the products of the Khabarovsk defense industry. He did not plead guilty.
Longreads
The Novaya Gazeta Europe [European edition of the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta] has reported on the persecution of elderly residents of the occupied territories of Ukraine, whom the Russian authorities sentenced to long terms on charges of treason for monetary transfers to Ukraine.