The severe manpower crisis of Ukraine’s armed forces continues to be on display, particularly after the recent decision of the government to deny embassy and consular services for Ukrainian men of fighting age who live abroad but refuse to come back home.
Ukraine’s parliament on Wednesday just once again upped the controversy and advanced a dramatic change in law and national policy. It passed a bill enabling select prisoners to be released in order to fight in the armed forces.
“The parliament has voted ‘yes,'” MP Olena Shuliak, head of Zelensky’s party, announced in a social media post. “The draft law opens the possibility for certain categories of prisoners who expressed a desire to defend their country to join the Defense Forces,” she said.
Ironically Moscow has previously come under international condemnation and mockery for just such a policy.
AFP and other international outlets acknowledged this as follows: “Long-opposed to the measure and having criticized Moscow’s mobilization of prisoners to fill its ranks, Kyiv has recently U-turned amid fresh Russian advances on the battlefield,” a report said.
The legislation still has to be signed by parliament’s chairperson and President Zelensky in order to come into force as an active policy. The bill includes the following reported stipulations and parameters:
- Prisoners must volunteer
- Only those with three or more years left on their sentence can apply
- Those convicted of violent sexual crimes are not eligible
- Former high-ranking officials and those guilty of “serious corruption” are not eligible
- Prisoners who killed two or people are not eligible
One glaring aspect is that it appears literal murderers can possibly still go free if they join the army, so long as they killed no more than one person, based on the AFP’s reporting
Hellbound and Down 
