russian soldiers refusing to fight in ukraine
Ukrainian . The announcement triggered an exodus of men from Russia, with many fleeing to neighbouring countries including Armenia, Georgia and Kazakhstan. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved, When disinfo specialists lie, Gray Ladys DeSantis frustration and other commentary, Putins former spin doctor-turned-critic dead, Ukraines northeastern front could decide new battle lines, Biden needs to step up military aid for Ukraine fast. Russias troops in Ukraine are largely made up of contract soldiers: volunteer personnel who sign fixed-term contracts for service. Homesick. But by September that had all changed. Sergey's complaints about lack of equipment have also emerged in phone conversations alleged to be between Russian soldiers and their families, intercepted and posted online by the Ukrainian security services. Your effort and contribution in providing this feedback is much Updated at 1:10 p.m. on April 14 to add that the soldier's lawyer has taken down the original photo of the service card. But they eventually calmed down because there wasnt much they could do, he said. I didnt think I would quit, but it happened because of my wifes difficult pregnancy, when I asked for a delay until after she gave birth, a third soldier told Current Time in a VK message. Soldiers with the 127th Regiment of the 1st Army Corps rioted, according to the operational command. A Russian soldier has been sentenced for refusing to fight in the war in Ukraine. The head of Britain's GCHQ spy service said on Wednesday that new intelligence showed some Russian soldiers in Ukraine had refused to carry out orders, sabotaged their own equipment and . If we had moved gradually, if we had checked the roads for mines many losses could have been avoided.". A Russian serviceman takes part in military exercises outside the city of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in the Russian Far East on September 4. My daughter was born three months ago. Sergei made several trips to the front line to try to secure his son's release. This is one of many reported incidents where Russian soldiers have been accused of refusing to take up arms in Ukraine. According to an audio recording shared with Current Time, commanders met with the insubordinate soldiers on July 17, alternately threatening, begging, and trying to coerce them to remain in service or rescind their resignation requests. For four and a half months, Corporal Ilya Kaminsky and his fellow soldiers from the 11th Separate Air Assault Brigade have waged war as part of the grinding Russian military offensive that has slowly pushed Ukrainian troops back in eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian media claims a "riot" broke out on the warships, based in nearby Crimea.. At the same time, a number of Russian helicopters and drones were flying over Luzanivka beach, preparing for landing.. They made him lie on the ground and told him to count to ten. The arrests of the soldiers, whose . Second, the conduct of the war by Russian forces violates the most . Russian troops release video as they say they will not fight. A Warner Bros. Russian state media aired footage of blitzed buildings and abandoned streets in Bakhmut , the eastern city where Ukrainian forces have been . Among them were 12 national guardsmen from Russia's . But you cannot force people to fight.". Our commanders didnt even argue with us because we were not the first ones to leave, Bokov said. Human rights activist Sergei Krivenko says he is not aware of any prosecutions of those refusing to return to the front. Read about our approach to external linking. ", "My first thoughts were 'Is this really happening to me?'". Newsweek was unable to independently verify those claims but reached out to Russia's foreign ministry for comment. Russian forces were driven out of much of the northeastern Kharkiv region in early September by a Ukrainian counter-offensive that allowed Kyiv to retake thousands of square kilometres of territory. His unit moved on through the Ukrainian countryside, but there was a clear lack of strategy, he says. "We rushed forward with short overnight stays, without trenches, without reconnaissance. "So off he went to Ukraine. Like us on Facebook to see similar stories . 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"We do not have any camps or incarceration facilities, or the like [for Russian soldiers]," President Putin insisted earlier this month. The men, who belonged to the key headquarters of the Pskov . He's changed completely. Along with eight others, Dmitri told his commanders that he refused to rejoin the invasion. He said the "Russian invasion of Ukraine has triggered the most massive violations of human rights" being witnessed in the world today. "Then they took him into a room and told him: 'You're coming with us, otherwise we'll kill you.' If I dont get the compensation that I am entitled to soon, I will go public and make a major issue of it., Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. 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Before joining Current Times Moscow bureau in 2019, Rozhanskiy worked for the independent Russian television channel TV Rain. Leviev says his team estimates a sizeable minority of the Russian contract soldiers sent to Ukraine to fight in the initial invasion refused to go back again. But the soldier later discussed with his father what would happen if he refused to fight. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. During wartime, rules are totally different. I have served for five years in the army. But from our own side.". CNN's Frederik Pleitgen reports on the conflictin Ukraine as Russian President Vladimir Putin touts success, yet some ofhis soldiers refuse to fight. Almost immediately his unit found itself under attack. RUSSIAN soldiers are suffering from low morale with some reportedly refusing to fight the war in Ukraine, according to a member of an elite Russian army unit on the ground. Such an action would be "premature" without having assessed the harm to the military service he was involved in, the prosecutor said. Emilio Morenatti. The president announced what he called a "partial mobilisation", drafting hundreds of thousands of Russian citizens into the armed forces. As casualties have mounted, so have Ukrainian officials' efforts to appeal directly to the Russian people, saying they are being lied to about a war Moscow still calls a "special operation . In another incident where Russian soldiers have been accused of refusing to fight in Ukraine, the country's Operational Command South said Sunday in a Facebook post that a Russian military unit deployed in the south would not fight because of a lack of vital supplies such as water. Other units include troops from private military companies like Vagner, or specialized, semiautonomous units overseen by Chechnyas strongman leader, Ramzan Kadyrov. They don't care about the life of a soldier; whats more important is his position and rank, Kaminsky said. RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's ongoing invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. Some troops are refusing orders, walking away from military bases or crossing the border into Ukraine and switching sides, media reports show. Not from the opposing side. Instead they were expected to operate without even basic equipment, such as night vision devices, he says. "Those refusing to fight are doing so because they've had more than their fair share of front line action," explains Elena Popova. Early in the war, Kaminsky said, commanders ordered the brigade to defend a line opposite Ukrainian forces that stretched up to 64 kilometers in length (40 miles) about four times what the brigades troop strength could reasonably protect. Within the dense smoke caused by the propaganda of one side or the other, the truth is that there does seem to be a good number of Russian soldiers who have refused to fight in Ukraine. Brigade has suffered "extremely high casualties" while fighting in Ukraine. April 16, 2022 17:49 GMT. ", "We do not have any problems with soldiers leaving combat positions," the Kremlin leader continued. "It's a way of making people go back into that bloodbath," says Elena Popova from Russia's Movement of Conscientious Objectors. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty 2023 RFE/RL, Inc. All Rights Reserved. If a soldier acts according to such procedures, then he cannot be criminally prosecuted for this. It said that the troops lacked support, while personnel in advanced positions didn't have water. ET. I told him: 'Better to take it. Then I started getting messages from him asking what would happen if he refused to fight.". Sergey is just one of hundreds of Russian soldiers understood to have been seeking such advice. But that means that - while his letter of refusal to fight was accepted - there are no guarantees he won't be sent back to Ukraine during his service period. "They beat him and then they took him outside as if they were going to shoot him. In conversations with Current Time via the Russian social media giant VK, several soldiers from the brigade disputed the circumstances behind their inclusion on the wall of shame. It's not a war of liberation.' When the soldiers of an elite Russian army brigade were told in early April to prepare for a second deployment to Ukraine, fear broke out among the ranks. And there is no guarantee that more prosecutions might not emerge in the future. Lee said one option for the Kremlin would be to authorise the deployment of conscript units to Ukraine, despite Putins earlier pledges that Russia would not use any conscripts in the war. But, he had been sufficiently worried about his unit's reaction to his refusal that he decided to seek legal advice. An investigation by the BBCs Russian service showed that Russias defence ministry filled employment websites with vacancies, offering people with no combat experience opportunities to join the army on lucrative short-term contracts. Among them were 12 national guardsmen from Russias southern city of Krasnodar who were fired after refusing to go to Ukraine. But without conscript battalions, Russia could soon struggle to hold the territory it currently controls in Ukraine, especially as Ukraine receives better equipment from Nato, he said. Some Russian troops are refusing to return to fight in Ukraine because of their experiences on the front line at the start of the invasion, according to Russian human rights lawyers and activists. He is now home in Russia, having taken legal advice to avoid being sent back to the front line. In Buryatia, where the 11th Brigade is based, dozens of personnel have sought legal assistance from local activists, seeking to break their contracts and get out of service in Ukraine, for various reasons. Belarus allowed Russia to stage part of the invasion from its . Source: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Facebook, Quote from the General Staff: "Troops from the so-called volunteer Cossack Detachment, attached to the 155th Marine Brigade of the Russian Pacific Fleet, are refusing to continue to take part in offensive operations due to the failure of the offensive and significant personnel losses near Vuhledar.". The Insider. The enemy has somewhat reduced its activity for the fourth day, he said. Dmitri's refusal to fight in the war is the latest in a string of reports of Russian soldiers disobeying orders to join the fight. Under Russian military rules, troops who refuse to fight in Ukraine can face dismissal but cannot be prosecuted, said Mikhail Benyash, a lawyer who has been advising soldiers who choose that option. Unit commanders then staged an intervention. The young Russian was among those men who enlisted. In another incident, Sergey says he had to overtake comrades trapped inside a burning vehicle in front of him. Read about our approach to external linking. A video of the incident that circulated online showed the soldier complaining of poor training, using obscenities, and calling the drills an imitation. Did you encounter any technical issues? They haven't been seen for five months. The Russian defense ministry didnt respond to the Guardians request for comment. We didn't leave anyone in the rear, so if someone decided to come in from behind and hit us there was no protection. "In a situation when there is shelling or bombs falling, all normal people cannot help but react to it, even on the physiological level. The prisoners at the penal colony in St. Petersburg were expecting a visit by officials, thinking it would be some sort of inspection. I understand everything, of course. And while the current status of the conflict gives Russian soldiers a legal path to refuse participation, some soldiers have complained that it has also led to them not being adequately cared for. "He told me he had refused to lead his men to a certain death," Oxana tells me. Read about our approach to external linking. He bombarded military officials, prosecutors and investigators with appeals for help. They would be looking at time in prison.. Eventually his efforts paid off. "They beat him and then they took him outside as if they were going to shoot him. War-weary Russian soldiers have been thrown in jail by their commanders after they refused to fight in Ukraine over the invasions total disregard for human life, a new report claims. The Ukrainian military on Friday reported significant fighting near Ivankiv, about 40 miles north west of Kyiv, as Russian forces apparently tried to advance on the capital from the north. Source: General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on Facebook. In phone conversations with Current Time, he said troops were not granted any leave for 4 1/2 months, even as the losses and casualties for the brigade mounted: Up to half of the brigades personnel -- around 1,000 -- have been either killed or wounded in action, he said. But I was thinking, Im still young; at any moment, a piece of shrapnel, a bullet could fly into my head. Of the Pskov father what would happen if he refused to rejoin the invasion from its told... 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russian soldiers refusing to fight in ukraine