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In late May, Russia released a group of women from prison to fight in the war against Ukraine, The New York Times reports, citing two former prisoners who are in contact with those still in jail on June 10.
According to the NYT, military recruiters taken several
women from a prison near St. Petersburg. It is unclear whether their release is
an isolated case, a pilot program, or the beginning of a larger wave of
recruitment.
It is noted that at the beginning of the full-scale
invasion, about 30,000 women were serving their sentences in Russian prisons.
Military recruiters began making rounds in prisons for women
throughout European part of the Russia in fall of 2023. However, until now,
convicted women who joined the military have remained imprisoned without
official explanation.
The NYT writes that recruitment of convicted women comes at
a time when Kremlin is resorting to more unconventional schemes to attract
volunteers from marginalized segments of Russian society in an effort to avoid
another draft.
It is currently unknown what duties conscripts will perform
at the front. Recruiters offered prisoners contracts for a year for the
positions of snipers, combat medics and front-line radio operators.
The publication claims that only about 40 out of 400
prisoners agreed to this. The women were offered a pardon and a salary about
$2,000 a month, which is about ten times more than minimum wage in Russia.
According to former prisoners, harsh conditions in Russian
prisons contributed to the fact that some women agreed to go to the front.
At the end of May, the Financial Times reported that in the coming months Russia could launch a new wave of mobilization, “going beyond its creative recruitment strategies.”
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