Mobilization in Russia for Oct. 19-21, 2025 CIT Volunteer Summary
Authorities and Legislation
In a second reading, the State Duma [lower house of Russia’s Federal Assembly] approved a bill on "year-round conscription." Medical examinations, psychological screenings and draft board meetings would run continuously from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, rather than only during the current spring and fall campaigns. The dispatch of conscripts to their units, however, will remain within the established windows of April 1 to July 15 and Oct. 1 to Dec. 31. Lawmakers introduced amendments ahead of the second reading stipulating that the appearance date on a draft notice posted in the Draft Register must not exceed 30 days from its publication, and the draft notices themselves should be enforceable nationwide.
The State Duma also approved a bill in its second and third readings that would expand the list of participants in the war against Ukraine eligible for combat veteran status. The list would include individuals who signed contracts with the Ministry of Defense between Oct. 1, 2022, and Sept. 1, 2023, and performed "tasks as part of special units during the special military operation." This criterion likely refers to members of Storm-Z and other assault units formed from convicts.
Moreover, lawmakers introduced a bill in the State Duma to lower the age of criminal responsibility to 14 from 16 for a range of sabotage and terrorism-related offenses. They decided to add all sabotage-related articles to this list: committing sabotage, aiding sabotage activities, undergoing training for sabotage, and organizing or participating in a sabotage community. For terrorism-related articles, the responsibility age would also be lowered for cases involving aiding terrorism and organizing terrorist communities and organizations. Furthermore, the bill would abolish statutes of limitations and prohibit sentences below the prescribed minimum for all sabotage articles. It would also complicate parole access for convicts and ban suspended sentences for those convicted of participating in "sabotage communities."
Army Recruitment
Vazhnyye Istorii [IStories, independent Russian investigative media outlet], citing data from the Judicial Department under Russia’s Supreme Court, calculated that in the first half of 2025, 350 convicted individuals were released from serving their sentences due to participation in the war. Among them were two people charged with murder, and 41 convicted of violent crimes. The largest group—118 individuals—had been convicted of theft, fraud, robbery, or armed assault. Another 57 avoided punishment for traffic violations, 32 for drug-related offenses, and 25 for military crimes. Among those released were two women, four government employees, and four foreign nationals—three of them citizens of CIS countries.
Another 274 criminal cases were closed by courts before reaching a verdict because the defendants were sent to war, according to calculations by the Sever.Realii [part of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty] online media outlet. Of these, 107 cases involved minor offenses, 58—moderate crimes, 95—serious crimes, and 14—particularly serious ones. Most of the closed cases were related to property crimes (105), violations of transport safety regulations (50), and drug-related offenses (22). None of the terminated cases involved murder charges. However, there were two murder cases in which the defendants received suspended sentences after signing a military contract.
An additional 25,300 criminal cases were suspended for reasons unrelated to the defendants being wanted or ill, according to calculations by the Esli Byt’ Tochnym [To Be Precise] media outlet based on the same data. In 2019, there were only 648 such cases. This surge is apparently linked to amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code that allow cases to be suspended if defendants are sent to the frontline. The same trend may explain the record decline in the number of people held in pre-trial detention centers—in 2024, there were 88,500 detainees, down by 15,000 from the previous year, marking the lowest figure in two decades.
Several municipalities in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous region–Yugra [Russia's federal subject] have introduced bounty-style payments for recruiting volunteer fighters for the war. The authorities in the town of Langepas are offering 230,000 rubles [$2,840] to those who help find new army recruits. Similar measures were approved in the city of Nefteyugansk on Sept. 25, the town of Uray on Oct. 13, and the city of Nizhnevartovsk on Oct. 15—where the payments amount to 200,000 rubles [$2,470]. Those who enlist in the region receive 2.65 million rubles [$32,800] upon signing a contract, plus an additional 100,000 rubles [$1,240] from municipal authorities and 400,000 rubles [$4,950] from the national government.
Marat Abdyushev, a 33-year-old from Krasnodar, who attacked a police officer in October 2024, has signed a contract with the MoD and has been deployed to the war. The criminal case against him has been suspended. Since his arrest, Abdyushev has been held in a pre-trial detention facility on charges of assaulting a police officer, robbery, and theft of firearms. Abdyushev has been wanted since 2023. In 2020, he was charged with fraud.
Arkady Morozov, a 27-year-old from Saint Petersburg, who killed his 18-year-old girlfriend in May 2025, has also signed a contract with the MoD and was sent to the frontline. His case has also been suspended.
Fall Conscription Campaign
The Idite Lesom! [Flee through the woods/Get lost you all] project continues to document roundups in the Moscow metro. It is reported that young people, including those with exempt medical diagnoses, are being detained near escalators and in passageways between metro stations and taken to police stations. From there, they are sent to the central military collection point on Ugreshskaya Street. Human rights activists have noted that this year, the start of the roundups in Moscow was earlier than in the previous year. They recommend that men of conscription age avoid traveling by metro or leave the city. The Idite Lesom! project has reported a massive number of complaints regarding calls from draft offices. The callers demand that the young men report to the draft office and threaten to declare them wanted, to apply criminal liability, to block bank cards, and to issue a 15-day arrest. In many cases, these young men have not been served draft notices. In some cases, calls are made to the parents of men of conscription age.
Human rights advocates from the Prizyv k Sovesti [Call to Conscience] coalition told Vazhnyye Istorii about several new cases of detentions using facial recognition technology. One conscript who was recently caught in a roundup said that men are being released from the processing point on Ugreshskaya Street if they are challenging their draft orders in court. Those released are issued a draft notice for a data check-up at the Unified Military Recruitment Center. Lawyers from Prizyv k Sovesti are currently handling at least three cases related to such roundups in Moscow and continue to receive new reports. Journalists from the Sibir.Realii [part of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty] online media outlet spoke with relatives of men detained in the Moscow and St. Petersburg roundups, who said the arrests took place even when the men had documents confirming their draft deferments. The detainees were reportedly threatened with draft-evasion charges and pressured to sign military contracts.
Mobilized Soldiers, Contract Soldiers and Conscripts
A 27-year-old orphan from Astrakhan, Maksim M., who served in the 1008th Motorized Rifle Regiment, spent four months trying to secure a discharge due to disability but was instead sent back to the front. He has been diagnosed with an organic personality disorder, classified as a Group 3 invalid, and deemed only partially fit for service (Category "V"). According to Maksim, after undergoing a medical evaluation and filing for discharge, his paperwork "disappeared," and his commanders once again sent him to Bakhmut.
In the first half of 2025, Russian courts received 25,600 civil lawsuits seeking to have individuals declared dead or missing, according to court data reviewed by Vazhnyye Istorii. That figure exceeds the total for all of 2024 and is five times higher than in the first half of that year. Courts approved 14,700 of the 15,300 cases they reviewed. During the same period a year earlier, the number was five times lower—2,900 approvals out of 5,000 cases considered.
Sentences, Legal Proceedings and Incidents
The Judicial Department at the Supreme Court has published data for the first half of 2025, revealing that:
- During this period, Russia recorded an unprecedented number of convictions for treason (115 people compared to 55 during the same period in 2024), espionage (12 people versus 18 a year earlier), divulgence of state secrets (45 people, up from 40 a year earlier), and "confidential" cooperation with foreigners (17 people; 21 were convicted throughout all of 2024). However, research by Pervyi Otdel [First Department], based on court case files, shows that the actual number of people repressed under these articles during the same period was: 177 treason cases, 17 espionage cases, and 25 cases of confidential cooperation. Thus, the Judicial Department's data is underreported by 43%.
- The Judicial Department's data does not account for court decisions issued in Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine—recently, Vazhnyye Istorii [IStories, independent Russian investigative media outlet] reported that in the three years since the "referendum," 53 treason convictions, 103 espionage convictions, 5 convictions under both articles, and 5 convictions for "confidential" cooperation with foreigners were handed down there. Of these, 45 convictions (23%) were issued in the first half of this year.
- A surge in repression has also been recorded under terrorism-related articles, with 628 people convicted, 210 of them for committing an act of terror—three times the figure for all of last year, when 75 people were convicted. Moreover, from the start of the war until the end of 2024, the number of people convicted of acts of terror increased 12.5-fold. Statistics on terrorism-related articles are also likely underreported: according to Pervyi Otdel, 659 people were convicted under them.
- In the first six months, another 48 people received sentences for sabotage—the same number as for all of last year. Most of those convicted are minors and young people. Since the start of the full-scale war, at least 158 teenagers aged 14 to 17 have been convicted under terrorism and sabotage articles in Russia and annexed Crimea. While 26 minors were tried in 2022, the number rose to 41 in 2024, and 29 in just the first half of 2025. It was previously reported that by the end of September 2025, the Federal Financial Monitoring Service of the Russian Federation (Rosfinmonitoring) had added 201 minors to its registry of "terrorists" and "extremists."
- a total of 4,125 individuals were convicted of military offences, with the majority of sentences involving going AWOL, desertion, and failure to obey an order. The number of such convictions has dramatically increased: from 1,379 in 2022, the figure rose to 4,409 in 2023, and then surged to 9,206 in 2024. This represents an increase of more than 6.5 times over the three-year period. In total, since the start of the full-scale invasion, courts have issued at least 18,000 verdicts under these specific articles, with approximately 10,000 of those occurring in 2024 alone.
- Russian courts issued convictions against 116 servicemen for murder in the first half of 2025, marking a two-fold increase from the 54 servicemen convicted during the same period in 2024. Additionally, the number of military personnel convicted for inflicting grievous bodily harm also rose, hitting 92 in the first half of 2025 compared to 80 the previous year.
- courts issued another 580 sentences for draft evasion. Notably, two young men received actual imprisonment, up to one year, for the first time in several years. Of the remaining cases, 576 individuals were punished with a fine, one was acquitted, and in 12 instances, the criminal case was closed on non-rehabilitative grounds.
In the military installation near Burmakino in the Yaroslavl region, soldier Yevgeny Vedeneev has been detained on suspicion of sexually assaulting and raping a local resident. Vedeneev has multiple prior criminal convictions.
The Odintsovo Garrison Military Court sentenced Ivan Kudryashov, a prisoner who enlisted for the war, to 20 years in prison. Together with his brother, he extorted money from soldiers undergoing medical treatment. The 20-year sentence takes into account the remaining time from his previous sentence. His brother was sentenced to 10 years. Ivan Kudryashov enlisted in the army in October 2023 from a penal colony, where he was serving an 18-year term for murder and fraud. The brothers were detained after a fight with a bar patron. At the trial, they stated that they now wanted to go to war together.
The Kursk Garrison Military Court sentenced serviceman Ramazan Gadzhimuradov to nine years in a penal colony. On February 7, 2025, in Belgorod, he caused a traffic accident involving an ambulance, which resulted in the deaths of two paramedics.
Three teenagers from Russia’s constituent Republic of Tatarstan were detained and accused of conspiring to commit a terrorist act. According to the investigation, the accused, "acting on the orders of foreign intelligence services," carried out an arson attack on railway equipment near Bugulma in August 2025. The teenagers were allegedly promised 24,000 rubles [$300] for the act, but they never received the money. Immediately after the arson, two 16-year-old college students and a 15-year-old high school student were detained and taken into custody.
The Federal Security Service (FSB) said it had detained a 25-year-old resident of the Stavropol region accused of plotting a terrorist attack. Investigators allege that the man, acting under instructions from his "handlers," planned to blow up the administration building of the Georgiyevsky municipal district.
In Moscow, law enforcement officers detained another man on suspicion of treason. According to the FSB, the detainee passed information to Ukraine about the locations of air-defense systems and military facilities in the Moscow region and the Krasnodar territory. He also allegedly provided his "Ukrainian handlers" with coordinates to guide missile and drone strikes.
Authorities charged Pavel Andreyev, founder of the Revolt Center, a cultural space in the northern city of Syktyvkar, with treason, apparently over actions committed by another man with the same name, a public-relations specialist from Ulyanovsk. Investigators accuse Andreyev of acting on behalf of a Danish representative and participating in the "Platform for Civil, Anti-War, and Humanitarian Initiatives," a group said to cooperate with European authorities and promote the creation of a “community of deserters in Armenia.”
However, open sources indicate that these activities were carried out by Pavel Andreyev from Ulyanovsk, who emigrated to Germany after the start of the war. Despite what appears to be an obvious case of mistaken identity, investigators have not closed the criminal case.
The FSB also claims that Andreyev received European Commission grants between 2020 and 2023 to support the 7x7 news outlet, which, the agency says, confirms his ties to EU institutions. In early July 2025, law enforcement officers raided the Revolt Center; soon after, reports emerged that a treason case had been opened against Andreyev.
A Tyumen resident was sentenced to 10 years in prison for treason; his name is redacted in the court's records. According to the prosecution, between January and February 2024, the man provided a representative of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense with information about a military unit in Tyumen, in exchange for a reward in bitcoin equivalent to approximately $100.
The Second Western District Military Court sentenced Anatoly Kapralov to 15 years and Gennady Blinov to 14 years in a maximum security penal colony for treason. Investigators alleged that the men, guided by their handlers from the Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, conducted financial transactions and assisted the Ukrainian armed forces. In August–September 2023, Kapralov allegedly transferred $676,000 "for support to accomplices of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" in Russia. He also, together with Blinov, purchased and shipped to Ukraine batches of SIM cards later used in drones that attacked the Soltsy-2 airbase in the Novgorod region and the Shaykovka military airfield in the Kaluga region in August 2023.
Longreads
The Vot Tak [Like This] media outlet has compiled a database of Russian commanders who regularly violate the rights of their subordinates denying the wounded evacuation from the battlefield, pocketing their pay, and sending them on "suicide missions."