03/05/2022 15:08

Active mobilization of men continues in the temporarily occupied territories

As previously reported, the occupiers resorted to forcibly "mobilizing" men who were medically unfit for service.

It is possible to avoid conscription only for "bribery", so corruption has flourished in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

To suppress it and ensure a stable supply of "cannon fodder" to the front on the instructions of Moscow to the pseudo-republics came observers from Russia.

Also, in order to "strengthen" the occupying army, the rashists are recruiting Cossacks from various branches of the Russian Federation to fight in Ukraine.

According to partner human rights organizations, the Cossack structure of the aggressor state is campaigning and sending volunteers to participate in the military aggression against Ukraine.  During April 2022, about 3,200-4,000 Cossacks arrived and were scattered along the entire front line.

According to relatives of the Cossacks and regional atamans, who refused to supply volunteers for the war, the first detachments of Cossacks were very quickly destroyed in the first weeks of April.

Now, Cossacks from the Kuban, Transcaucasian, and Siberian Cossack troops have arrived in Donbas.

The level of cooperation between the various units of the occupying forces - the "militias of Donbass", the russian army, the Cossacks, special units of the FSB at an extremely low level.  Disputes are growing over control over the property looted from Ukrainians, over the collection of "tribute".

The victims of such conflicts, mostly civilians, are forcibly mobilized residents of pseudo-republics, who are used by other units as slaves and to cover their own troops.

Forced mobilization in the occupied territories is a violation of Article 51 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War.

It strictly prohibits the occupying Power from forcing protected persons to serve in its armed or auxiliary forces.

I appeal to the UN Commission for Investigation Human Rights Violations during Russia's military invasion of Ukraine to take into account these facts of war crimes and human rights violations in Ukraine.