Russia continues to coerce Crimeans into its military and punishes those that resist

In the most recent example, the "court" for the city of Sudak has convicted a nineteen-year-old resident of the city in a "criminal" case for "evading military service in the absence of legal grounds for dismissal from this service." The website of the Russian occupation administration noted that “the defendant, being physically fit for mandatory military service, not being in military reserves, not having a deferral from the mandatory conscription, and having no legal grounds for exemption from the said military service, did not arrive on the day appointed in the conscription order by the military commissariat of Sudak and did not report the reasons for his failure to arrive.” Given that this was the defendant's first attempt to avoid mandatory conscription into the Russian military, the "court" sentenced him to a monetary fine (such fines could be equal to up to eighteen months worth of defendant's income or two hundred thousand rubles). Russia occupied Crimea in 2014 and started the illegal mandatory conscription of Ukrainian citizens to the Russian military service in 2015. So far, it has conducted 13 illegal mass drafts of Ukrainian citizens from Crimea into its armed forces. In total, at least 31 thousand Crimeans have been drafted into the Russian military. In 2021, the invaders plan to conscript up to three thousand Crimean residents. The conscription of the population of an occupied territory into the military of the occupying country is a violation of international humanitarian laws and the customs of war, as well as a war crime.

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