Ukraine is battling to find new recruits for its army as the 1000th day of war with Russia approaches with a torrent of videos emerging of civilians being brutally beaten and forced into vans by mobs of soldiers.
Episodes of unsuspecting Ukrainian men being press-ganged are becoming more frequent as Russian forces continue to grind down defensive lines in Eastern Ukraine and seize more territory in Donetsk.
In one clip, military men wearing fatigues and balaclavas to hide their identities are seen pulling a civilian away from his partner and forcing him up against the wall.
One of the press gangers delivers a brutal knee strike to the civilian’s head, crumpling him to the floor before he is bundled away.
In another incident, a soldier launches a flying kick at one man attempting to run away before others descend on him and push him into a waiting SUV, while a third clip shows a group of recruiters dragging a man onto a bus.
It comes weeks after military recruitment officers launched a spate of raids through restaurants, bars and concert venues in Kyiv, checking military registration documents and detaining men who had not complied.
It is unusual for such raids to take place in the capital and reflects Ukraine’s dire need for fresh recruits as the war with Russia rumbles toward its third year.
Ukraine has intensified its mobilisation drive this year, and a new law came into effect in April stipulating that those eligible for military service must input their information into an online system or face penalties.
Under martial law, all Ukrainian men aged 25-60 are eligible for conscription, and men aged 18-60 are not allowed to leave the country.
In their October conscription efforts, officers descended on Kyiv’s Palace of Sports venue after a concert by Ukrainian rock band Okean Elzy.
Footage aired by local media outlets appears to show officers stationed outside the doors of the concert hall intercepting men as they exit.
Local reports said raids were also conducted in clubs and restaurants across other Ukrainian cities, including Kharkiv and Dnipro in eastern and central Ukraine.
In the footage from Kyiv, officers were seen forcibly detaining some men understood to have avoided registration for the military.
One concertgoer was seen struggling and shouting: ‘Get away from me!’ at three policemen as they pulled him towards the recruitment desk set up outside the venue.
Men who refused to show documents exempting them from military service, or those whose documents were considered faulty, were also dragged away.
Several women who filmed the incident on their smartphones could be heard shouting: ‘Shame! Shame on you!’
A 27-year-old man said he left the concert as the last song was playing to avoid the recruitment officers.
He said men felt in danger of being drafted whenever they ventured outside.
The 27-year-old added that his university draft waiver was taken away after Ukraine passed laws in April that both lowered the draft-eligible age for men from 27 to 25 and did away with some draft exemptions.
More video footage circulating on social media has shown various instances in which Ukrainian men were surrounded by recruitment officers before being forced into vehicles, often after being beaten.
Martial law lets draft officers call up men over 27 to fight, and the separate measure signed into law in April by President Zelensky made thousands more men susceptible by lowering that minimum age to 25.
But commanders have said they are not receiving enough troops, raising suspicions of draft dodging.
New measures to increase troop numbers include requiring men to update their draft data with the authorities, boosting payments to those who volunteer, and letting some convicts serve.
It also adds some new punishments for draft dodging but stops short of severe measures that had prompted public opposition.
But Maksym Zhorin, a deputy commander of Ukraine’s third assault brigade, said the law would not lead to ‘miracles’ on the battlefield.
‘Undoubtedly, it will bring a little more order and systematise (things) in general on the issue of mobilization,’ he said. ‘Personally, I would make it much tougher and also continue to reduce the conscription age.’
Volunteers in the military must meet certain criteria to be eligible, as well as pass medical and fitness tests.
In March 2023, it was revealed that foreign fighters who joined the Ukrainian army were being forced into continued service, with reports suggesting some volunteers would not be allowed to return home until the war ends.
Would-be recruits were having second thoughts at the Polish border after being handed contracts that effectively make them conscripts, the Daily Mail previously revealed.
The Telegraph reported that some Ukrainian men are so desperate to escape mobilisation that they are risking their lives to break out of the country.
Oleksandr Danylyuk, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London, told the newspaper: ‘Mobilisation has begun to be perceived as a one-way ticket, where the only way to end service is to die or become disabled.’
In April, the Border Guard Service reported that at least 30 men had died trying to flee the country since the start of the war often by drowning while trying to swim across rivers of freezing to death on mountain passes.
