Mobilization in Russia for July 30-Aug. 1, 2024 CIT Volunteer Summary
Prisoner Swap
Russia and Western countries conducted a large-scale prisoner exchange, resulting in the release of 24 individuals (16 from the Russian side and 8 from the Western side). Among those freed from Russian imprisonment were Americans Paul Whelan and Evan Gershkovich, politicians Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Kara-Murza, human rights activist Oleg Orlov, artist Sasha Skochilenko, and teenager Kevin Lik. In return, FSB hitman Vadim Krasikov and spy couple Anna and Artyom Dultsev were sent back to Russia. Associated Press provides more details about the participants in the exchange. The Vyorstka media outlet discovered that the exchange agreement was reached following the resignation of one of the Federal Security Service (FSB) leaders, Sergey Beseda. This exchange is the largest in nearly 40 years. Mediazona [independent Russian media outlet] discusses previous exchanges between Russia and Western countries. Mediazona also notes that Russia has released just over 1% of political prisoners who had already been sentenced. Meanwhile, 766 people recognized as political prisoners by Memorial [human rights defense center] remain in Russian prisons. Additionally, 2,700 people are still being persecuted for political reasons, with more than 1,250 political prisoners currently behind bars.
Authorities and Legislation
On July 31, the State Duma [lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia] Defense Committee unexpectedly decided to rework the previously approved bill on "disciplinary arrests," which would grant military commanders the right to send their subordinates to a detention facility without a court decision and prohibit military personnel from using smartphones. The Voyennye Advokaty [Military Lawyers] Telegram channel notes that the committee proposed a single amendment: to allow smartphone use for carrying out combat duties. Chairman of the Committee Andrey Kartapolov stated that participants of the war against Ukraine had asked for the amendment. On the same day, the State Duma approved the revised version of the bill in consecutive second and third readings. As a result, military personnel could face arrest for up to 10 days without a court order and have their phones confiscated if they record complaints about pit detentions, hazing, wrongful "arrests," commanders or service conditions. Even though the bill has yet to be signed into law, there have already been reports of commanders confiscating phones from frontline military personnel.
On July 30, the State Duma definitively rejected a bill which would have granted fathers of three children exemption from mobilization. It had been introduced in September 2022 and would have exempted fathers of three or more children from mobilization, while also raising the dependents age limit to 18 years, or 23 if they are full-time students. The State Duma Defense Committee rejected the bill in May of this year, arguing that it would "lead to a shrinking of the cadre reserve." Andrey Krasov, First Deputy Chairman of the Defense Committee, stated during the parliamentary debate that a man must first defend his family before thinking how to feed it.
Furthermore, the State Duma approved in all three readings at once a bill requiring foreigners who acquire Russian citizenship to immediately register for military service. Earlier, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin had announced plans for such a bill, but its authors introduced it only the night before its consideration by the lower house. If passed, applicants would be required to register for military service before taking an oath to the Russian Federation. The authorities would have the right to revoke a citizenship if this condition is not met. Volodin had also called for "new citizens" to serve in the military for two years instead of one, but this proposal was not included in the approved bill. Senator Andrey Klishas indicated that the authorities will not be extending the duration of statutory military service for naturalized citizens. Meanwhile, members of the A Just Russia party introduced another bill which would allow deportation decisions to apply to all members of a foreign citizen’s family.
The Ministry of Defense has developed a draft decree on compensation payments to separatists—members of the Donetsk and Luhansk "people's militias"—who became disabled during combat operations starting from May 11, 2014. The proposed compensation amounts are 6 million rubles [$69,600] for severe disability, 5.2 million rubles [$60,300] for moderate disability, and 4.4 million rubles [$51,000] for mild disability.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs proposes granting Russian citizenship to foreigners who sign a contract with the Ministry of Defense, even if the applicant does not permanently reside in Russia, does not speak Russian, does not know the country's history and laws, and has certain restrictions regarding adherence to the law, participation in wars, criminal record, and entry ban.
Army Recruitment and Military Service Advertising
Vladimir Putin signed a decree increasing the sign-up bonus for concluding a contract with the Ministry of Defense to participate in the war. Individuals who sign a contract between Aug. 1 and Dec. 31, 2024, for at least one year will now receive 400,000 rubles [$4,640]. Previously, the federal payment was 195,000 rubles [$2,260]. Additionally, the decree recommends that regional heads set a payment from the regional budget at least at the same level—400,000 rubles [$4,640]. Thus, the minimum reward for going to war should now be 800,000 rubles [$9,280].
Some regions rushed to increase the sign-up bonus amounts to meet the recommendations. In Kabardino-Balkaria [Russia’s constituent republic], the bonus was raised from 800,000 rubles [$9,280] to 1.1 million rubles [$12,800]. In the Tula and Lipetsk regions, the payment was increased to 600,000 rubles [$6,960]. In the Saratov region, the amount was increased tenfold—from 50,000 rubles [$580] to 500,000 rubles [$5,800]. The same amount will now be paid in Chuvashia [Russia’s constituent republic]. In Udmurtia [Russia's constituent republic], the reward was increased eightfold—from 50,000 rubles [$580] to a minimum of 400,000 rubles [$4,640], with the same payment set in the Perm and Krasnoyarsk regions. The acting governor of the Kemerovo region, Ilya Seredyuk, announced plans to increase the sign-up bonus to 800,000 rubles [$9,280]. If this happens, the total payout in the region will be 1.2 million rubles [$13,900]. Meanwhile, in just the last few days, payments to contract soldiers in three Russian regions have been increased several times, and 11 regions are paying one million rubles [$11,600] or more for agreeing to go to war. In Saint Petersburg, new posters advertising contract-based military service already show a total payment amount of 2.1 million rubles [$24,400].
Magnitogorsk authorities introduced a municipal sign-up bonus of 100,000 rubles [$1,160] for concluding a contract with the Ministry of Defense. Previously, a similar bonus was introduced in the neighboring city of Miass. With these recent changes, those who sign a contract at the city’s draft office will receive a total of 900,000 rubles [$10,400] for participating in the war. Additionally, they will be paid up to 200,000 rubles [$2,320] for the in-house gas equipment installation and 20,000 rubles [$230] aid for each child.
According to an investigation by Vazhnyye Istorii [IStories, independent Russian investigative media outlet] and the Conflict Intelligence Team, the number of new contract soldiers reported by the Ministry of Defense may be inflated by 1.5 times. This conclusion is based on federal budget spending data. From the fall of 2022 to April 2024, approximately 426,000 Russians received a sign-up bonus of 195,000 rubles [$2,260] for concluding a contract, whereas the Ministry of Defense claimed that 640,000 contracts were signed. A source at a contract military service recruitment facility confirmed to Vazhnyye Istorii that regions reached only 50-60% of their recruitment targets in 2023.
A number of reports have emerged indicating that several individuals, who were either under investigation or convicted of a crime, have signed up for the war against Ukraine. Among them is Sergey Chonsky, the mayor of the Katanga district of the Irkutsk region, who has been in a pre-trial detention center since November 2023 on charges of receiving bribes of nearly 5 million rubles [$58,000]. He has been released from pre-trial detention and will shortly be deployed to the frontline. Another individual going to war is Dmitry Trapeznikov, an entrepreneur from Yekaterinburg, who was sentenced to eight years in a penal colony for kidnapping and beating his ex-wife. As a result of the physical abuse, the woman, who was in her second month of pregnancy, had a miscarriage. On May 10, Trapeznikov signed up for contract-based military service and left for the Russian-annexed Donetsk region of Ukraine. Furthermore, Grigory Avakyan, the prosecutor from Russia’s constituent Republic of North Ossetia–Alania, who was accused of raping a subordinate, requested to go to war. He is currently under arrest until Sept. 15 and has already undergone a military medical examination. Another new recruit is a resident of the village of Itatka in the Tomsk region, who had attempted to burn his elderly mother and her partner.
Mobilized Soldiers, Volunteer Fighters and Contract Soldiers
The list of mobilized soldiers killed in the war has been updated to include Roman Malovichko and Aleksandr Romanov from the Rostov region, Pavel Adamsonov from the Tyumen region, Vladimir Voloshkin and Vitaly Belov from the Belgorod region, as well as Aleksandr Kotenko from the Volgograd region.
Relatives of 41-year-old Mikhail Pyankovsky from the Irkutsk region have complained that he has not received the promised payments after signing his contract. Pyankovsky signed the contract on June 1, 2024, and by June 9, he was already in Rostov-on-Don, from where he was sent to the area near the town of Avdiivka without any training. Pyankovsky last communicated with his family on June 19. He is now officially listed as missing in action. Since then, not a single payment has been deposited into the serviceman's account. At the draft office, relatives were told that they had nothing to do with the payments.
A criminal case for "failure to execute orders" has been opened against a mobilized soldier from Ussuriysk. While on the frontline, the man complained to his commanders about pain in his leg, which later began to turn blue. During a subsequent medical examination, the mobilized soldier was classified as having limited fitness for military service, but despite this, the criminal case was not dropped.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
A serviceman undergoing treatment for a leg wound has escaped from a hospital in Rostov-on-Don. The Military Prosecutor's Office is searching for the 30-year-old contract soldier.
A court in Magnitogorsk has sentenced a junior sergeant from Miass to 13 years in a maximum security penal colony for firing an assault rifle into a crowd, injuring four people.
The Vladimir Garrison Military Court has sentenced mobilized soldier Sergey Alekseev to seven years in a penal colony for desertion after he went AWOL and evaded law enforcement officers for over a year. This is the first sentence on this charge in the region since the beginning of the war.
A court in Vladivostok has sentenced a mobilized soldier to two and a half years in a penal colony for going AWOL. In the summer of 2023, the soldier enrolled in a part-time program at a state university and informed his command about this, and later filed a resignation request based on a student deferment from mobilization. The court ruled that the student deferment does not apply to men who have already been mobilized.
Military courts in southern Russia and the North Caucasus have issued the following sentences to military personnel for going AWOL:
- Aleksandr Potashov, a serviceman from the Rostov region, has been sentenced to five years and three months in a penal colony;
- Sergey Gritsenko, a mobilized soldier, has been sentenced to five years and four months in a penal colony;
- Ivan Zhitrenko, a contract soldier, has been sentenced to five and a half years on the same charge;
- Sergey Nekhaev, a mobilized soldier, has been sentenced to five years in a penal colony;Â
- Ramil Batkaev, who also failed to return to his unit from leave, has been sentenced to five years and two months in a maximum security penal colony.
The Supreme Court has ruled that a parent of a soldier killed in the war with Ukraine may be deprived of social benefits if they did not participate in the child's upbringing or pay child support. The former husband, who received approximately 6.5 million rubles ($75,400) in compensation for his deceased son, was alleged by the claimant to have neither contributed to the child's upbringing nor paid child support. The woman contested the decision favoring the former husband, but the courts upheld the ruling on the grounds that the father had not been deprived of parental rights. Ultimately, the Supreme Court disagreed with the lower courts, stating that considerations should include not only parental rights and biological relationship but also involvement in the child’s upbringing. The case has been sent for retrial.
Meanwhile, a court in the Omsk region has granted a claim by the mother of a deceased soldier, requesting that her former husband be stripped of the right to receive benefits following their son's death. According to the mother, the father neither paid child support, nor cared for, nor maintained contact with the son.
A former employee of penal colony No. 7 in the Vladimir region is accused of leaking state secrets. The 54-year-old man is accused of revealing confidential information about the forms and methods of operational investigative activities. According to Dovod [independent Russian media outlet], the colony houses prisoners of war from the Armed Forces of Ukraine and abducted Ukrainian civilians.0
It has also been reported that Oleksandr Ishchenko, a 55-year-old Ukrainian POW who served as a driver in the Azov Brigade, died in a pre-trial detention center in Rostov-on-Don. Ishchenko had volunteered for the territorial defense forces of the Azov Brigade in February 2022 and was later captured. He was accused of participating in the activities of a terrorist organization and attempting to seize power by force.
A resident of the Altai region was sentenced to 20 years for attempted treason and terrorist attack for allegedly attempting to poison water intended for mobilized soldiers preparing to deploy to the frontline. However, the water was not used for drinking or cooking, and no one was harmed. Seleznyov's arrest became known in the fall of 2023.
On appeal, the court upheld the sentence for Sergey Karmazin, a 46-year-old native of the Kharkiv region, who had previously been sentenced to 25 years in prison for arson of railway equipment in the Moscow region. Karmazin was found guilty on eight counts of the criminal code.
Moscow resident Ekaterina Zavalishina was sentenced to 13 years in a penal colony for treason, and on Aug. 1, the appellate court upheld the verdict. The woman has been in custody since June 2022.
The Novgorod Regional Court sentenced a 45-year-old native of Ukraine, Pyotr Opalnyk, to eight years in a penal colony for "confidential" cooperation with foreigners and attempting to organize the voluntary surrender of others.
On July 30, law enforcement officers detained two residents of the Leningrad region, aged 18 and 19, on charges of deliberate damage. They are suspected of setting fire to a cell tower on June 16.
The Vladimir court sentenced the former head of the financing department of the Ministry of Architecture and Construction of the Vladimir region, Zhanna Romanovskaya, to one and a half years in a penal colony for attempting to set fire to a draft office in June 2023. According to the woman, she was the victim of fraudsters.
Belgorod volunteer Nadin Geysler (Nadezhda Rossinskaya), who founded a women's volunteer movement, is suspected of treason. Initially, Geysler was charged with publicly calling for activities against state security. On July 15, a new criminal case was opened against her for financing terrorism.