Mobilization in Russia for May 26-28, 2026 CIT Volunteer Summary

Authorities and Legislation

Private companies are now allowed to purchase large-caliber weapons and equipment to defend against drone attacks, RBC [Russian media group] reported, citing sources. Russian authorities approved a mechanism allowing businesses to acquire turrets, anti-aircraft artillery systems, radar equipment, motor vehicles and electronic warfare systems, among other items, to equip mobile fire teams. Most regions in the European part of Russia are now forming new teams. One RBC source said private companies will immediately transfer the weapons and equipment they buy to military units. The Ministry of Industry and Trade has also compiled a catalog of passive protection equipment recommended for businesses, although private companies have long been able to buy that equipment for their own use on the open market.

Army Recruitment

Prime Minister Sergey Artamonov of Chuvashia [Russia’s constituent republic] reported the creation of the first regional "BARS" (Special Combat Army Reserve) volunteer unit to combat drones. He said fighters have already completed two weeks of training and will begin duty on June 1. The unit began forming shortly after drone attacks on the city of Cheboksary on May 5. Authorities in the Voronezh and Vladimir regions, as well as the Perm region [Russia’s federal subject], had previously announced a new wave of similar units.

The 12th Main Directorate of the Ministry of Defense, which oversees developments in Russia’s military nuclear sector, the preparation of nuclear weapons tests, and the storage and maintenance of the country’s nuclear arsenal, has joined the large-scale recruitment campaign targeting students for UAV units. The directorate has long been involved in promoting contract military service among students, but in 2026 its personnel became involved in the MoD’s new campaign specifically focused on recruiting for units of the Unmanned Systems Forces. Meetings between representatives of the 12th Main Directorate and students from various cities have become increasingly frequent. Officials have visited universities in the Irkutsk, Saratov, Lipetsk and Nizhny Novgorod regions. Prospective drone operators are promised a "special one-year contract without extension" and military service "without participation in the special military operation." The directorate is also recruiting UAV instructors to work at training ranges and train new recruits.

Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts

Andrey Kiyko, known in the media as the "Sosnovsky Maniac," who was reportedly being searched for in the Leningrad region following reports of his escape from a military hospital, likely was killed in the war against Ukraine back in late 2025. Kiyko has reportedly been listed as missing in action since December 2025 after a drone strike hit the trench where he was located. The bodies of those killed in the strike were reportedly not evacuated. Earlier, media outlets had reported that Kiyko escaped in fall 2025 from a hospital in the city of Kronstadt, where he had been undergoing treatment for wounds. However, according to fellow servicemen and relatives, he returned to the combat zone after completing treatment. Kiyko’s mother says she received an official notice of his disappearance on Dec. 26. According to her, representatives of his military unit removed him from the hospital in October. At the same time, according to Fontanka [pro-Russian media outlet of the Leningrad region], Kiyko remains on the federal wanted list on an AWOL case. Meanwhile, Mediazona [independent Russian media outlet] was unable to confirm his death through state registries.

Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents

Serviceman Vyacheslav Kosov has been sentenced to 10 years in a maximum security penal colony for murder. According to the court, on Dec. 28, 2025, Kosov got into an argument with another man during a New Year corporate party at a café in the village of Gorny and stabbed him in the chest. The victim died at the scene. Afterward, Kosov reportedly sat back down at the table, lit a cigarette and continued drinking alcohol while waiting for law enforcement officers to arrive.

A resident of Yekaterinburg said she was brutally assaulted by her husband, a former serviceman who had returned from the war. The incident took place on the evening of May 22 at a café where they encountered each other by chance. The man first attacked the woman’s mother and then assaulted his wife, tearing out a clump of her hair. According to the woman, her husband had assaulted her before, and she had repeatedly contacted the police, but no criminal case was ever opened against him. The morning after the attack, she filed another complaint against him.

A Moscow court sentenced 25-year-old war participant Stanislav Dobrovolsky to 15 days of administrative arrest on charges of petty hooliganism. On the evening of May 21, the serviceman entered a bakery in Moscow and began harassing staff. He claimed to have grenades in his backpack and threatened to kill law enforcement officers and their families if the police were called. Police later arrived at the scene, cordoned off the building and detained him.

The Vladimir Garrison Military Court has handed down a series of verdicts involving war participants accused of sexual violence-related crimes: three convictions on rape charges, including one case involving a minor victim; three more convictions for violent sexual acts; and two additional convictions for sexual intercourse and indecent acts involving a child under the age of 16. In the latter category, one serviceman was additionally charged with causing death.

Since the beginning of 2026, the same court has also received more than 58 criminal cases involving charges of going AWOL. By comparison, the court received 132 such cases in 2024, 78 in 2023 and only eight during all of 2022.

In two consecutive readings, lawmakers in the Novosibirsk region passed a regional bill prohibiting the sale of gasoline, diesel fuel and other flammable substances to minors. Regional prosecutor Aleksandr Buchman said the initiative responds to cases of minors being drawn into committing arson attacks. With the Novosibirsk region included, such restrictions are now in effect in 10 regions. Starting Sept. 1, 2026, similar bans are set to take effect in three more regions.

In the Omsk region, a 14-year-old teenager has been placed under house arrest in a sabotage case. According to investigators, on May 20, acting on instructions from "handlers" on Telegram, he set fire to a relay cabinet on the Lyubinskaya-Dragunskaya railway section for 39,000 rubles [$550]. The cabinet burned down completely. The teenager filmed his actions on a smartphone camera and sent the video report to the "handler."

In Saint Petersburg, police detained a 23-year-old unemployed local resident suspected of setting fire to equipment at the Ruchyi railway station. A criminal case has been opened against him on charges of an act of terror. According to law enforcement, the young man received instructions from an unidentified "handler" via a messenger app. The detainee himself said he committed the arson because he needed money.

A court in Saint Petersburg also placed a 15-year-old teenager named Dmitry in a pre-trial detention center on charges of committing an act of terror. According to investigators, on the afternoon of May 26, he acted on instructions from an unidentified handler via a messenger app. He set fire to a transformer substation near the Polyustrovo railway station while filming his actions, and then fled the scene. Dmitry was detained the following day and partially admitted guilt.

The FSB said it had detained a 40-year-old resident of the Ryazan region suspected of treason. According to the intelligence services, since 2025 the man had passed information via Telegram to a representative of Ukrainian intelligence about military, industrial and fuel-and-energy facilities in the region, as well as about Russian service members who had taken part in the war against Ukraine.

A court in the Krasnodar region upheld the detention of the 24-year-old artist Lada Sendovskaya in a case involving terrorist attacks. Sendovskaya's case had not previously been reported. She was added to the list of the Federal Financial Monitoring Service of the Russian Federation (Rosfinmonitoring) back in September 2024, but her initial pretrial restrictions did not involve detention. According to Mediazona, Sendovskaya set fire to relay cabinets under the influence of scammers in July 2024. She had previously taught at an art school in the settlement of Ilsky and practiced decorative and applied arts.

A 17-year-old resident of the Kaliningrad region was sentenced to six years in a penal colony on a charge of a terrorist attack. According to investigators, the teenager had a conversation in a messenger app with unknown people who persuaded him to set fire to two railway facilities in the region: a battery cabinet and a relay cabinet. In the summer of 2025, he set the fires on the Znamensk-Gvardeysk railway section and later fled, but was eventually detained. Other details of the case, as well as the name of the convicted person, are unknown.

A Bryansk regional court sentenced Kirill Denisenko, a Krasnodar resident, to nine and a half years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of attempted high treason and illegal border crossing. According to the court, Denisenko traveled to the Bryansk region intending to cross the border into Ukraine on foot. After crossing, he allegedly planned to join the Armed Forces of Ukraine. He was detained during the attempted crossing.

Aleksandr Dubrovsky, 24, a resident of Prokopyevsk in the Kemerovo region, was sentenced to 12 years in a penal colony on charges of aiding terrorist activities, justifying terrorism, membership in a terrorist organization and insulting the memory of defenders of the fatherland. Investigators determined that Dubrovsky administered the Telegram channel of the Russian Volunteer Corps and shared posts online endorsing the organization’s raids and sabotage operations.

Aleksandr Novosad, 52, a Chelyabinsk resident, was sentenced to 17 years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of high treason, justifying terrorism and incitement to extremism. According to the prosecution, in November 2023 Novosad transferred 15,000 rubles [$210] to a Russian bank account at the request of a person investigators identified as a representative of the AFU, and posted comments in various Telegram channels including "Glory to Ukraine" and "Death to Putin." Novosad insisted he believed the recipient was an ordinary Ukrainian to whom he was sending money for food and did not plead guilty to the high treason charge. On March 27, 2024, Novosad was assaulted during his detention and was subjected to abuse during a subsequent search of his home.

The Southern District Military Court sentenced Andrey Shilyayev, a resident of Rostov-on-Don, to 21 years in prison on charges including participation in the activities of a terrorist organization, illegal possession of explosives and treason. According to investigators, between February and April 16, 2024, Shilyayev agreed to carry out an assignment on behalf of the Russian Volunteer Corps. Prosecutors said he had been instructed to retrieve explosives and improvised explosive devices from a hidden cache and relocate them to another location. Law enforcement officers detained him while he was carrying out the assignment.

The Moscow Regional Court sentenced Nika Guinh, a 28-year-old dental clinic employee from the city of Berdiansk, to 12 and a half years in a penal colony on treason charges. Guinh was detained in Moscow in October 2024, as reported by BBC News Russian. According to information obtained by Mediazona, prosecutors accused her of carrying out assignments for Ukrainian organizations. She maintained, however, that she did not know on whose behalf she had been acting.

The same court also sentenced Vladimir Alekseenko, 29, to 12 years in a maximum security penal colony after convicting him of treason. Law enforcement officers alleged that he had provided "financial assistance to a foreign state and a foreign organization engaged in activities directed against Russia’s security." No further details about the case were made public.

The "LPR Supreme Court," created by the Russian authorities, has sentenced 57-year-old Kostiantyn Miroshnychenko to 13.5 years in a maximum security penal colony on charges of espionage. According to investigators, between February and September 2022, Miroshnychenko, a citizen of Ukraine, voluntarily collected information on the location of Russian temporary bases in the Svatove district of the occupied part of the Luhansk region. He transmitted the collected information to Ukrainian intelligence services via a messaging app.

A female resident of the occupied Berdiansk district of the Zaporizhzhia region, identified by human rights activists as 34-year-old Anna Bieliaieva, was sentenced to 14 years in a penal colony in an espionage case. According to investigators, in May 2022, following the death of her partner—a Ukrainian serviceman who participated in the defense of the city of Mariupol—Bieliaieva began transmitting information to the AFU about the movement of Russian military equipment through a settlement in the Berdiansk district, paying particular attention to helicopters and aircraft.

Novaya Gazeta [independent Russian newspaper] and the OVD-Info independent human rights project released an investigation into minors convicted in Russia in cases involving terrorism, sabotage and high treason. According to human rights defenders, since the beginning of the war, at least 117 teenagers have received prison sentences in such cases. The authors note that many of the accused committed arson and similar acts not for political reasons, but in response to promises of easy money.

Assistance

Russia's constituent Republic of Udmurtia allocated 5.3 billion rubles [$74.64 million] from its 2025 budget toward war-related expenses. Of that sum, 4.8 billion rubles [$67.60 million] was allocated to supporting war participants and their families, 162.5 million rubles [$2.29 million] to accommodating refugees and another 120.9 million rubles [$1.7 million] to the reconstruction of the "patronized" Lutuhyne district in the Russian-occupied part of the Luhansk region of Ukraine. Meanwhile, Udmurtia's budget deficit reached 4.6 billion rubles [$64.78 million] in 2025.

Children and Militarization

In Murmansk, UAV troops were promoted to high school students during the Last Bell 2026 graduation ceremony held at the Ice Palace. Graduates, most of whom were between 16 and 18 years old, were shown a demonstration area with drones and invited to try operating them. The Voin [Warrior] center, which organized the demonstration, also encouraged graduates to enlist in UAV forces. More than 1,500 schoolchildren participated in the event.