Ukraine assures no compulsory return of military-aged men for mobilization

Ukraine will not compel military-aged men to return for mobilization against Russia‘s invasion, according to a senior Ukrainian official.

“So there will be no restrictions or forced returns of Ukrainian citizens of any sex or age to a country that is at war,” Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Olha Stefanishyna said Tuesday, per a Ukrainian media translation. “But there are no pleasant solutions to war issues, and let’s not forget that the war continues, and we must win it.”

Ukraine faces a growing need for new manpower after two years of war that have brought high casualties and generated intensifying domestic pressure to allow veterans to return from the front lines. Under martial law, most men between the ages of 18-60 are banned from leaving the country, but Ukrainian officials are trying to gather more information on the number of fighting-capable Ukrainian men amid protracted deliberations on how to draft additional forces in the third year of full-scale war.

“Ukraine has adopted the mobilization law, and we have to understand to what extent we can replace the guys on the front line,” Stefanishyna said. “This is about the potential of mobilization — the registry and information. And that is the primary goal of our decision.”

Ukrainian military officials opened a recruitment center in Kyiv on Tuesday, the first of its kind in the Ukrainian capital, according to Ukrainska Pravda. And Ukrainian Foreign Ministry officials announced last week that they intend to suspend the renewal of passports for the estimated 860,000 Ukrainian men living abroad.

“How it looks like now: A man of conscription age went abroad, showing his state that he does not care about its survival, and then comes and wants to receive services from this state,” Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said last week, per the New York Times. “It does not work this way. Our country is at war.”

Kuleba’s announcement drew a mixed response from Ukraine’s neighbors in the European Union. “Ukraine needs to have its mobilization plans,” Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said Monday. “Ukraine must have the means and instruments to invite its young men to serve their homeland. We must cooperate with Ukraine in every sense.”

Yet another senior Lithuanian official in the Migration Department cautioned that “there would be a huge question of how this would be compatible with EU law” because the EU has provided temporary protection status to Ukrainian expatriates displaced by the war.

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“The Ministry of Internal Affairs has no plan for the forced repatriation of Ukrainian citizens legally residing in Estonia who fled because of the war, including Ukrainian citizens who belong to the target group of possible Ukrainian mobilization,” Estonian Internal Affairs Ministry senior adviser Anneli Viks said Tuesday.

The Ukrainian foreign ministry subsequently moderated its tone by clarifying that “men of military age who have updated their personal details in accordance with the requirements of the law will be able to apply for consular services.”