The
announcement by Colonel Andrei Biryukov, an official in an armed
forces department responsible for the draft, appeared aimed at
quelling speculation that Russia may quickly use the new system
to launch another mass call-up for the war in Ukraine.
Russia is currently in the process of calling up 147,000 men
aged 18 to 27 between April 1 and July 15 to perform compulsory
military service as part of its longstanding twice-yearly
conscription cycle.
Biryukov said the first conscripts would be dispatched to
"permanent deployment points on the territory of the Russian
Federation" from April 20.
He emphasised that some people were still entitled to defer
their military service, and said there would be no mass mailings
of new electronic summonses to people of conscript age.
The current planned cohort of spring conscripts is 12,500 bigger
than the 134,500 who were called up this time last year.
Conscripts require months of training and Russia has said they
will not be sent into war zones in Ukraine, after acknowledging
cases where this had happened in the first weeks of the conflict
last year.
But they provide a pool of young, trained personnel who can then
be encouraged or pressured into signing up as professional
soldiers as Russia pursues its stated aim of boosting the armed
forces by more than 30% to 1.5 million.
Tens if not hundreds of thousands of Russian men have fled
abroad since the start of the war, an exodus that peaked last
September when Putin ordered a special mobilisation of 300,000
reservists with previous military experience - the first of its
kind since World War Two.
Putin on Friday signed new legislation introducing electronic
draft papers, replacing a previous system where call-up notices
had to be hand-delivered.
The new draft regime will close numerous loopholes exploited by
draft dodgers and lays the groundwork for Russia to carry out a
much more thorough and wider mobilisation campaign if and when
it decides to do so.
Under the new rules, citizens who evade the draft will be banned
from travelling abroad and face other restrictions including on
loans and state benefits.
(Reporting by Mark Trevelyan; Editing by Frances Kerry)
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