A billboard promoting contract army service with a the slogan reading “Serving Russia is a real job” sits in Saint Petersburg, Russia, on September 20, 2022.
Olga Maltseva/AFP via Getty Images
Reports last week found that Russians who were not eligible to fight were still being drafted.
The Kremlin admitted on Monday that it made “errors” in selecting draftees, Reuters reported.
Officials are “working to rectify the situation,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.
The Kremlin it had made “errors” when it was selecting draftees to go and fight in Ukraine, and that it hopes troop mobilization will speed up after it corrects them.
Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin, admitted to reporters on Monday that some of the recent call-ups have been issued in error.
He added that officials in some regions are now “actively working to rectify the situation,” Reuters reported.
“There have been cases when the decree is violated,” Peskov said, according to Reuters. “These cases of non-compliance with the required criteria are being eliminated.”
His comments come amid multiple reports of Russian officials calling up unsuitable candidates in a scramble to bulk up its army in Ukraine.
Putin announced a partial military mobilization last week, pledging to call up 300,000 people. Those are only supposed to come from Russia’s existing pool of military reservists.
But a 26-year-old lecturer at a Russian university told the BBC last week that he was drafted into the military despite not having any combat experience.
And a 63-year-old man with Type 2 diabetes and a brain condition known as cerebral ischemia told the independent Russian news site The Insider that he was also drafted in the war.
Officials said that the new decree announced by Putin would affect only those with a military background and that no students or Russians over 60 would be called up.
Putin’s partial mobilization announcement caused panic in Russia, with one-way plane tickets out of Moscow sold out, and satellite imagery showing cars queuing at crossing points along Russia’s borders.
During the Monday press conference, Peskov also denied rumors that Russia would close its land borders to prevent eligible men from fleeing the draft.
“I don’t know anything about this,” Peskov told reporters, according to Reuters. “At the moment no decisions have been taken on this.”