A Russian soldier is wounded by a shot at a recruitment center in Siberia

First modification: 09/26/2022 – 19:47

Tension continues to rise in Russia following Vladimir Putin’s announcement to mobilize 300,000 reservists to go to the front in the war against Ukraine. This Monday, September 26, a 25-year-old Russian man who had been mobilized attacked a military officer at a recruitment center by shooting him with a firearm. The wounded man is in critical condition and there are fears for his life.

The attacker, identified as Ruslan Zinin, entered the office in the Siberian city of Ust-Ilimsk shouting “no one will go to fight” and “we will all go home now”, according to independent local media. The aggressor was arrested and the authorities confirmed that he “will receive a harsh punishment for what happened.”

Apparently, the center was recruiting dozens of people from this city located more than 1,000 kilometers from Moscow, with the aim of transferring them to the Ukrainian front this Tuesday. The attacker asked the rest of the people to leave the scene to shoot exclusively at the military commander.

Discomfort over compulsory recruitment for reservists and the civilian population has increased in recent days throughout Russia, especially in the provinces furthest from the Kremlin, which are the ones with the highest recruitment rates. The protests have occurred and up to 17 recruitment centers were vandalized with fires and Molotov cocktails that caused partial damage.

Local authorities in regions such as Irkutsk, where the events took place, have condemned the situation. “I am ashamed that this is happening at a time when we should instead be united. We must not fight against ourselves, but against real threats”, declared the governor of this region.

The Kremlin plans to mobilize more than 300,000 soldiers in order to alleviate the counteroffensive launched by Ukraine in the Donbass region. This operation, the first mobilization of these characteristics since the Second World War, has broken with the speech launched by Putin in which he defended that it was a limited military operation that did not interfere in the lives of the majority of Russians.

The situation has also generated that up to 260,000 people have collapsed the border crossings of nations such as Georgia or Finland in order to avoid being recruited. At the border crossings, it has already been reported that they have prevented the departure of several men of fighting age and it is feared that this Tuesday, once the result of the Russian referendums in Ukrainian regions is known, the borders will be closed completely.

In addition, it has generated much controversy that the regions with the highest number of recruits are non-European, those furthest from Moscow and where protests are more difficult to take place.

Reserve troops are already mobilizing

A British intelligence report indicates that tens of thousands of Russian soldiers have already arrived at the military bases of this nation and that they will begin arriving at the Ukrainian front soon. The next few weeks should be dedicated to the training of the battalions, but the British source assures that they are leaving in advance to cover casualties without such deep training.

The situation on the Ukrainian front has become especially complicated in recent weeks in Russia after the latest Ukrainian counteroffensive. Russian casualties have numbered in the tens of thousands since the war began more than seven months ago, and Moscow fears losing the positions it has gained in Donbass and southern Ukraine.

Meanwhile, this Tuesday the results of the referendums in the Ukrainian regions taken to be part of Russia will be known. Results that are intuited will be affirmative and that will suppose the immediate annexation of Russia, although few among the international community will recognize it.

With AP and local media