Russia does not seem willing to let military recruitment get out of hand and thousands of men flee the country, as happened last fall after Russian President Vladimir Putin decreed a partial military mobilization to strengthen the troops sent to Ukraine. To avoid this, the Duma (Lower House of Parliament) approved a bill on Tuesday that digitizes the entire process and applies restrictions to whoever is recruited, including a ban on leaving the country.
Taking advantage of a bill that was postponed in 2019, on Monday, April 10, the deputies introduced several amendments that adapt the legislation to the current situation of conflict in Ukraine and the interests of Russia. They will affect the recruits who must join the military service every year, but also those who are called in an extraordinary mobilization.
Currently, in Russia, summons to serve in the Army is delivered in person at the local enlistment office, through a recruiter, or at work. From now on they will be delivered electronically, via email or the state services website (Gosuslugui), and also by certified mail.
“The summons will be considered received at the moment it is entered into the personal account of the person obliged to perform military service,” Andrei Kartapolov, one of the authors of the changes and chairman of the Commission for the Defense of Military Service, explained on television. the Duma.
This will prevent the affected party from avoiding the recruiter, as could happen up to now. In addition, from that moment, the affected party will automatically be disqualified from traveling abroad.
The Russians have a period of two weeks to appear once they have been notified of their obligation to serve the homeland. But if they are not presented within a period of 20 calendar days, other restrictions will be applied provisionally. Among them, their driving license will be provisionally cancelled, they will not be able to register as self-employed workers, they will not be able to buy real estate and they will not be able to apply for bank credits or loans.
The new legislative amendments also contemplate the creation of a digital registry, with personal data of military subjects that will be automatically collected from other public resources, such as the Russian Treasury, the Ministry of the Interior, the Central Election Commission, the Ministry of Education, the Courts of Justice or medical organizations, among other bodies. From now on no one will be able to argue that they did not know that they had received an official notification.
According to the authors of the new wording, the law tries to correct the “mistakes” made during the autumn mobilization. The Kremlin then vowed to correct what it called “mistakes” after men unfit for conscription because of their age or health were called up to fight in Ukraine.
“From our point of view, these amendments will contribute to social justice. And it is that service in the Armed Forces is not only a sacred duty, but an honorable constitutional obligation,” Kartapolov said.
With the fall mobilization, more than 300,000 reservists are believed to have joined the Russian army to support what Russia calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine.
The announcement of that mobilization caused tens of thousands of men of enlisting age to flee abroad. Protests also broke out in many Russian cities, though they were quickly put down.
The Kremlin spokesman, Dimitri Peskov, denied on Tuesday that this law paves the way for a second mobilization. According to him, it is part of the modernization of the military registry.
Although Moscow ended the military mobilization, Putin did not sign a decree to end it, as he did when he started it. That has periodically raised fears of a “second wave” of mobilization. Russian authorities have repeatedly denied that they are planning it.
