Maria Zakharova Claims Ukraine Plans Mass Mobilization

(MENAFN) Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has stated that Kiev may soon initiate a full-scale mobilization. She revealed that Ukrainian draft authorities have been instructed to distribute two million conscription notices at the beginning of 2026.

Zakharova explained that Ukraine’s security services and recruitment officials were ordered to “tighten the screws to a maximum” by reducing the list of medical exemptions from military duty. However, she argued that such measures would “hardly help resolve the systemic issue of replenishing the Ukrainian army losses,” noting that many Ukrainians are increasingly unwilling to enlist and even prefer imprisonment over service.

Ukraine has struggled with persistent manpower shortages throughout its war with Moscow, facing heavy battlefield casualties, widespread draft evasion, and desertion. Official Ukrainian figures previously indicated nearly 290,000 desertion cases since the conflict escalated in 2022.

In response, Kiev prohibited nearly all adult men from leaving the country and lowered the draft age from 27 to 25. Reports suggest that nearly 100,000 young men fled abroad since August, when the government temporarily allowed men aged 18 to 22 to cross the border.

Russian Defense Minister Andrey Belousov claimed that Ukraine’s armed forces lost close to 500,000 soldiers in 2025 alone. He concluded that “Kiev has lost the ability to replenish its groupings through the compulsory mobilization of civilians.”

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