Mobilization in Russia for March 27-30, 2025 CIT Volunteer Summary

Army Recruitment and Military Service Advertising

Law enforcement officers raided a Moscow fitness club in search of draft dodgers, forcing everyone present—both men and women—to lie face-down on the floor before dividing them by ethnicity into "Russians" and "non-Russians," customers reported. Officers then checked each person’s record in a conscription database, releasing those with proper military registration and taking anyone without a passport or registration for further verification, one visitor said. Employees noted that "such roundups happen everywhere now." It is worth noting that Russia’s next spring conscription campaign begins on April 1.

Vitaly Nosov could head to war, even though a court convicted him of sexual violence against his 13-year-old daughter on July 7, 2024. An appellate court upheld the decision on Oct. 8, 2024. The child’s mother says Nosov has sent letters to his daughter through his own mother, promising to "definitely return" from prison and "take her away." She also reports that he now intends to sign a contract with the Ministry of Defense.

Magadan resident Aleksandr Korobeynikov signed a contract with the MoD and left for the war in Ukraine before the court could issue a verdict in a torture case involving his own children. Evidence submitted to the court indicated that from at least January 2020 through July 2023, Korobeynikov and his wife "systematically inflicted physical and psychological harm on their underage son and daughter," as punishment for school grades and disobedience. On July 20, 2023, doctors documented that the abused girl had sustained a traumatic brain injury, a concussion and 74 other injuries.

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 100,001 Russian fighters killed in Ukraine, including 11,628 mobilized soldiers. Over the past week, the list has grown by 888 soldiers.

Andrey Bolotin, a 20-year-old conscript from the Perm region, has been reported killed in the war on Dec. 6, 2024, near the border with Ukraine in the Belgorod region, as stated in his obituary. The circumstances of his death remain unknown. The administration of the Krasnovishersky district in the Perm region reported Bolotin's death in January 2025, but did not mention that he was performing statutory military service.

Aleksandr Kovalyov, a 43-year-old mobilized soldier from the Samara region, was invited to receive the Medal of the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland," only to be detained, beaten and deployed to forward positions upon arriving at his military unit. Before this, he was forced to sign up for contract military service. Kovalyov was mobilized as an assault trooper in the 85th Motorized Rifle Brigade. During combat, he suffered frostbite and was sent to a hospital. He was subsequently transferred to the 15th Motorized Rifle Brigade with promises of deployment to Syria; however, he was soon returned to the Luhansk region, where he sustained further injuries. Kovalyov underwent surgery to remove shrapnel and part of his internal organs. In December 2023, he returned home to the Samara region. A year later, in December 2024, he received a call inviting him to an award ceremony. He went to the military unit together with his wife, but she was denied entry. Later, he twice informed his family of being assaulted by a commander and was subsequently sent to an assault mission. His wife reported that other injured soldiers, including some using crutches, were also deployed on the mission with him. Since Jan. 31, 2025, Kovalyov has been listed as missing in action. He never received the award.

Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents

In the city of Barnaul, a previously convicted war participant, 55-year-old Vladimir Klementyev, was detained for attacking police officers. In 2019, Klementyev "with particular cruelty" stabbed a father and daughter to death in Barnaul. For this, he was sentenced to 19 years in prison. After the full-scale invasion began, Klementyev was recruited for the war, later wounded and then pardoned by Putin.

War participant Yevgeny Shevtsov carried out a stabbing attack at a military hospital in the town of Solnechnogorsk. After an argument, he went to the ward of another patient, soldier Sergey Bankin, and, while the latter was sleeping, stabbed him in the chest before fleeing. The victim underwent surgery and is now in serious condition. Meanwhile, Shevtsov has expressed a desire to return to the frontline.

A case has been filed against Aleksey Sidorov, a former fellow soldier of 20-year-old conscript Kirill Poluyanov, who was found hanged in a forest 10 kilometers from his military unit in June 2024. Sidorov is accused of extortion. According to the deceased soldier’s mother, authorities initially considered charging Sidorov with incitement to suicide and violations of military regulations, but investigators lacked sufficient evidence. She claims that Sidorov, as a senior serviceman, beat her son and demanded money from him in exchange for "permission" to use his own phone. The family believes the investigation is being deliberately delayed—investigators did not seize security camera footage, analyze phone records or examine the deceased's belongings.

Aleksey Vysokov, former CEO of the Perm-based Telta telephone plant, was detained at a training unit in the Voronezh region. According to investigators, he had previously stolen 48 million rubles [$568,900] from the state defense order before signing a contract with the MoD. Vysokov managed to escape after being released from a pre-trial detention center under house arrest in February. The Moscow City Court has ordered his return to pre-trial detention.

A court has sentenced 35-year-old Ukrainian Viktor Svetlichny, who was conscripted into the "People's Militia of the Donetsk People's Republic", to seven years in a maximum-security penal colony for desertion. He was mobilized in 2022, and after Russia annexed the Donetsk region, he was automatically enlisted in the Russian Armed Forces despite not holding a Russian passport. In March 2023, Svetlichny was granted leave but never returned to the army, instead relocating to the town of Kostomuksha in Karelia. Case files state that he "intended to evade service entirely." In April 2023, after already abandoning his duty station, he obtained a Russian passport, hoping the new document would make it harder to track him down. Initially charged with going AWOL, he later faced more severe charges.

A father of seven has been sentenced to five and a half years of probation for going AWOL. The contract soldier returned home on leave last summer to visit his wife and their seven underage children. Toward the end of his leave, his wife broke her leg, prompting him to request an extension from the military commissariat [enlistment office] so he could care for the children during her recovery. Witnesses testified in court that his leave had been extended. However, the military commissar denied receiving such a request, and no written records confirming the extension were found in the case files.

In March 2025, 16 new criminal cases for going AWOL or leaving a duty station were submitted to the Vladimir Garrison Military Court in March 2025. Since the beginning of the invasion, the court has received more than 262 criminal cases under this charge. By comparison, in 2021, the court issued only two verdicts on this charge, and in 2020, just six.

A 54-year-old female employee of a draft office in the Moscow region has been sentenced to five years in a penal colony for helping men obtain the service fitness category "V" (partially fit for military service). For amounts ranging from 150,000 [$1,770] to 400,000 rubles [$4,740], she ensured that a conscript received the necessary diagnosis for this category. During her tenure, she "exempted" at least four conscripts from military service.

On March 28, the office of the pro-government All-Russia People's Front movement in Abakan, where components for drones, camouflage nets, generators, clothing and other supplies for war participants were stored, was set on fire. A video of the arson, recorded by eyewitnesses, shows two young people "throwing something into a window, after which a fire instantly ignites." As a result, "half of the premises burned down," according to the All-Russia People's Front. The Ministry of Internal Affairs reported the initiation of a criminal case for deliberate destruction of property, and the next day, police detained two suspects—teenagers aged 16 and 17. According to the police, the detainees agreed to set fire to the office for money offered by an unknown person via a messenger app. The All-Russia People's Front stated that the damage amounted to "several million rubles."

Law enforcement officers have detained an 18-year-old resident of annexed Crimea who administered a Telegram channel with an "anti-Russian and neo-Nazi orientation." The Federal Security Service (FSB) claims that the young man was "involved in attacks and inflicting bodily harm on citizens, damaging their property, committing arson and drawing extremist symbols." Additionally, according to the intelligence service, the young man communicated with "the leader of a terrorist organization from Ukraine," who allegedly instructed him to set fire to a mosque in exchange for a $1,000 payment. Additionally, the suspect is accused of distributing Molotov cocktails and other items to other residents of the peninsula through hidden caches so that they could commit crimes for money. The rewards, according to the FSB, were paid in cryptocurrency by "handlers from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU)." A criminal case has been opened against the detainee for preparing to commit a terrorist attack.

The FSB has also reported the detention of a man accused of planning to blow up an administrative building in Moscow. According to law enforcement, in February 2025, the Moscow resident was recruited by Ukrainian intelligence services. During interrogation, the detainee revealed that he was preparing to transport explosives "to a power line." After carrying out the attack, he was allegedly promised assistance in leaving for Ukraine to participate in the war against Russia and $10,000 as a reward. A criminal case has been opened against him for attempting to commit a terrorist attack and for the illegal acquisition and storage of explosives. According to the FSB, the detainee, whose identity has not been disclosed, had previously been convicted of murder, extortion and robbery.

Viktoria Spitsyna, a 23-year-old woman, has been arrested in Saint Petersburg on charges related to a terrorist attack. According to investigators, in February, she filmed a railway station in the Saratov region that is used to supply aircraft fuel, including for the Russian Aerospace Forces. She then allegedly sent the photos and videos to her clients. Spitsyna was detained on March 26 and is being held in a pre-trial detention center until May 25.

FSB officers in Saint Petersburg have detained a man on suspicion of treason. According to law enforcement, he was an "opponent of the government and a supporter of Navalny" and administered pro-Ukrainian and opposition resources, communicated with Ukrainian intelligence and sent money to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In a video released by Rosgvardia [the Russian National Guard], the man states that he acted voluntarily and understood that he could face criminal prosecution for his donations.

A court in Rostov-on-Don has sentenced Kristina Kastornaya, a resident of the Stavropol region, to 19 years in a penal colony after finding her guilty of treason, preparing an act of terror, illegal possession of explosives, committed as part of a group, illegal manufacture of explosive substances and preparing for a crime. According to the FSB, Kastornaya communicated on social media with an officer from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense's Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) and "voluntarily agreed" to assist him. At the GUR's request, she photographed FSB and MoD facilities and "began preparations for a terrorist attack." She also rented a basement where she stored components for an improvised explosive device that she had purchased.

Mediazona has identified the name of a lieutenant colonel who was sentenced on March 10 to 13 years in a maximum-security penal colony and stripped of his reserve colonel rank for transferring cryptocurrency to support the AFU. According to the court, this concerns Oleksandr Vechirko. He was arrested in the summer of 2023 and charged with treason. Vechirko was born in the city of Vinnytsia, Ukraine.

The court sentenced 19-year-old Ivan Melnychuk from Volgograd to 12 years in prison for cooperating with a foreign state and participating in the activities of a terrorist organization. According to the court, Melnychuk joined an extremist organization in 2023 and allegedly established contact with a Ukrainian intelligence services agent. Between 2023 and 2024, he collected and transmitted information about military facilities in the city of Volgograd and the Astrakhan region.

Children and Educational System

In Severodvinsk, former Wagner Group mercenary Konstantin Khozyakin conducted a class for elementary school pupils at a school. A man with the same name was sentenced to seven years in penal colony in 2019 for drug distribution and, last summer, he was sentenced to forced labor for theft.