MOSCOW, April 11 (Portal) – Russia is poised to introduce electronic military enlistment papers for the first time in its history to make it harder for men to evade enlistment as it seeks to perfect a system it will use to support its system has armed forces in Ukraine.
The State Duma, the lower house of parliament, is due to consider the move – which requires changing the law – at a session on Tuesday, although government officials say there are currently no plans to force more men to fight in Ukraine.
Russia said it mobilized just over 300,000 men last year to help pursue what it calls its “military special operation,” but is now focusing on recruiting professional volunteer soldiers through a publicity campaign.
“We need to perfect and modernize the military enlistment system,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday at a regular news conference, during which he also recalled “problems” encountered in the mobilization campaign over the past year.
The initial decision to introduce mobilization for the first time since World War II prompted tens of thousands of draft-age men to flee abroad, while some protests erupted in several Russian cities – and were quickly suppressed.
NO SECOND MOBILIZATION
Peskov dismissed suggestions that the digitization plans could trigger another wave of panic and emigration among young Russian males desperate to avoid fighting in Ukraine.
“(This plan) is not linked to mobilization,” he said, echoing previous assurances that there were no plans for a second wave of mobilization.
Under the current system, men who are attacked by military recruiters receive a paper summons to their registered addresses.
Recruiters sometimes have trouble confirming whether or not a subpoena has been received, or whether they have the correct address for a draftee.
Under the new proposals, subpoenas would be sent electronically to a prospective conscript’s personal account on the government’s main portal. They are deemed to have been delivered once they have been delivered electronically.
Once the electronic subpoena is received, citizens who fail to show up at the military recruitment office would be automatically barred from entering the foreign country.
“The subpoena is considered received from the moment it is received in the personal account of a person subject to military service,” said the chairman of the Defense Committee of the Russian Parliament Andrei Kartapolov on TV.
The Kremlin last year vowed to fix “mistakes” in its first mobilization campaign, in which men who were ineligible for conscription due to age or illness were called up to fight in Ukraine.
Reporting by Andrew Osborn and Caleb Davis Editing by Gareth Jones and Andrew Osborn
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