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Draft legislation aimed at replenishing Ukraine's depleted and
exhausted armed forces is stalled in parliament, but one of the
proposed changes is to ensure soldiers who have fought for three
years can be discharged.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said that the military
proposed mobilizing 450-500,000 more Ukrainians for the war.
The families of some service members on long rotations have
urged Zelenskiy to find ways of relieving them, but members of a
drone unit fighting near the ruined city of Bakhmut believe such
hopes are unrealistic.
"Thirty six months is a huge chunk of life but what can you do?
You must fight the enemy," said a 51-year-old drone pilot, whose
call sign is "Mac", speaking at night in a bunker position, as
machine gun fire crackled nearby.
"I personally cannot imagine demobilising and living a civilian
life while the war is still going on," added the soldier from
the 92nd Separate Assault Brigade's drone battalion. "I will
stay until we win."
The battalion's commander, Yurii Fedorenko, said more troops
were needed to allow assault troops in particular to pull back
to positions further from the front to recuperate and be
replaced by fresh units.
But he, too, cast doubt on the idea of being discharged after
three years.
"Let's not cheat each other, this is not going to happen," he
told Reuters at his command post in a separate location.
"If we let these people, experienced officers, sergeants,
soldiers, people capable of performing combat tasks ... if we
let them go, there will be no one left to fight."
(Editing by Christina Fincher)
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