Thousands of Russians conscripted into military service in Ukraine have been sent home after being deemed unfit for duty. Al Jazeera.

Mykhailo Degtyarev, the governor of Khabarovsk Krai in Russia’s Far East, said that over the course of 10 days, several thousand men reported for military service, but many of them did not meet the requirements.

“About half of them returned home because they did not meet the selection criteria for military service,” Degtyarev said in a video post on the Telegram messenger.

He clarified that the military commissar of the Khabarovsk Territory of the Russian Federation was dismissed, but his dismissal will not affect the mobilization.

Russia’s first call to arms since World War II, announced on September 21, sparked widespread discontent and forced thousands to flee abroad.

The move was called bringing in those with military experience.

The military commissar of St. Petersburg corrected the number of conscripts that the military administration mobilized in the city, saying that in fact it is 10 times less than originally announced, reports Meduza.

Colonel Ilfat Abzalov initially said that 80,000 registration orders had been issued to citizens of Russia’s second-largest city. Then he returned and told the TASS agency that there were only 8,000 of them.

h2. Domestic criticism for mobilization

Meanwhile, domestic criticism of Putin’s war in Ukraine has grown.

About 2,000 people were arrested during anti-war protests in more than 30 cities, and independent news agencies reported that some of those detained had received summonses to appear before military police stations.

Russian officials, usually supportive of the president, also expressed anger over the mobilization, a rare display of dissent.

Among them, the president of the upper chamber of the Russian Federation Council, Valentina Matviyenko, called the mistakes made during the sending of draft documents “absolutely unacceptable.”

She called on Putin to correct mistakes regarding partial crowding

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday called for “mistakes to be corrected” in Russia’s ongoing mobilization for its offensive in Ukraine, as discontent grows over the often chaotic convocation of new recruits, AFP reported.

Mass media and Russians in social networks report cases of mobilization of elderly people, students, patients or conscripts without military experience. The mobilization also caused demonstrations and the flight of thousands of people abroad.

“This mobilization raises many questions. It is necessary to correct all mistakes and make sure that they are not repeated,” Putin reprimanded during a video conference with the Security Council, which was broadcast on Russian television.

The President touched upon the challenge of the heads of large families, the seriously ill and the elderly, who must be released by law.

“If a mistake was made, it should be corrected, and those who were summoned without good reasons should be returned home,” Putin said.

According to the specialized organization OVD-Info, since the announcement on September 21, more than 2,400 people have been arrested during anti-mobilization actions in Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmytro Peskov already admitted on Monday that “mistakes” had been made during the mobilization, which was supposed to involve 300,000 reservists with military experience or useful skills such as truck drivers.

Russians crossed the border between their native country and Georgia on foot due to fear of mobilization. Photo: Zurab Tsertsvadze / AP / Profimedia

Russians are fleeing the country

More than 200,000 people left Russia for Georgia, Kazakhstan and the European Union after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced an immediate “partial mobilization” of Russian citizens on Sept. 21, according to official figures from several countries, CNN reported.

About 100,000 Russians have crossed into Kazakhstan in the past week, Marat Kozheev, Kazakhstan’s deputy interior minister, said on Wednesday, according to state news agency Kazinform.

According to data released on Tuesday by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia, at least 53,136 people crossed the border between Russia and Georgia from September 21 to 26.

Some 66,000 Russian citizens entered the European Union in the last week (September 19-25) – an increase of more than 30% compared to the previous week, the European border police and coastguard agency Frontex said on Tuesday.

They are sent to the front without training and equipment

In recent days, numerous videos have appeared on social media showing that the mobilization that Vladimir Putin ordered last Wednesday is proceeding in a chaotic manner, with some videos showing heavily intoxicated Russian recruits heading to training centers going viral in social networks.

“There are people over 50 who have health problems,” said George Barros of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW). This observation was confirmed by numerous stories and videos posted on social media.

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Reservists must be trained and equipped before going to war, Barros explained. However, many will now undergo only one or two months of training, which is far from enough.

Mobilization of reservists in Russian Irkutsk Photo: Kyrylo Shipitsyn / Sputnik / Profimedia

Others are even sent to the front without any training or equipment, he said, adding that the only thing these conditions can lead to is more casualties.

A video posted on social media on Monday showed other recruits in training being told to grab absorbent pads and tampons to stop bleeding in case they were wounded.

Another video shows Russian conscripts who have been ordered to join being forced to build fires in the woods to keep from freezing to death while they wait to be transported to training centers.

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Other records show the conditions under which Russian recruits who received a conscription order are trained. “Great conditions in authentic wooden barracks for an unforgettable impression of the Russian army,” says Dmytro, founder of the WarTranslated website, wryly.