Ukraine

Current situation & recent developments

Conscientious objection to military service has ceased to be recognised in Ukraine since the full-scale Russian invasion on 24 February 2022, and discharge from the army for reasons of conscience was never allowed. Under the current mobilisation, no applications for alternative service have been granted, intensifying policies of total compulsory military registration and further conscription are ruling out conscientious objection. New mobilisation legislation aims at coercing everyone to register under fear of sanctions, fines, warrants and forced transporting to military recruitment centres by police. Those who have persisted in declaring themselves conscientious objectors have been prosecuted as draft evaders. Strategic communications humiliating all males who don't serve in the army as "draft evaders" create toxic public opinion, and an atmosphere of contempt and discrimination against holders of any non-militarist views and beliefs, where, in the words of a researcher of nonviolent resistance, conscientious objection became a social taboo.^[2],^[3] Instead, men and women are encouraged to serve in the army voluntarily by omnipresent advertising. The media and even human rights organisations ignore persecution of conscientious objectors or shame them as "draft evaders," and long-term militarisation of society for the sake of victory and survival after the victory became a main topic in the media. The domestic Law of Ukraine "On Alternative (Non-Military) Service" is currently applied not for protection of conscientious objectors but for denial in access to alternative service. Conscientious objectors have to rely on appeals, rarely successful, to constitutional principles and Ukraine’s international human rights obligations, but courts and officials, with rare exceptions, are mostly accommodating to army's denial of conscientious objection. Also, traditionally, there are gaps and corruption helping wealthy people to circumvent hard mobilisation.

Military duty in Ukraine, as defined by the Law of Ukraine "On military duty and military service," includes mandatory military registration and service in the armed forces or the reserve, as well as preparatory courses in all educational institutions, for instance “national patriotic upbringing”, which starts from the first grade. All students in high school without exception are taught the basics of military doctrine and national security, civil defence and tactical medicine. Pre-conscription training, including the use of weapons, is mandatory for boys (apart of those exempted on the grounds of health or religious beliefs) and can be chosen voluntarily by girls with parental permission. In military lyceums cadets from childhood live in an atmosphere of army discipline, for other children summer camps of scouts are organised for the same purpose of military upbringing. All males from the beginning of the year of the 17th birthday, with some exemptions on the grounds of medical unfitness or criminal record, must be registered and assigned to conscription units. Women trained in medicine or pharmacy are also subject to mandatory military registration, and other female professionals needed for army could register and enlist voluntarily.

Military service is available from age 17 for cadets in higher military education institutions and from age 18 by a contract. Conscription for term-limited service in age 18-24 was ceased under martial law to be replaced with 3 months universal basic military training, but from age 25 every person with military registration, recognised as fit to serve by the military medical commission, can be mobilised unless there is exemption or deferral prescribed by law for a wide variety of health, family, education and occupation reasons, including work at positions considered vital for functioning of government and economy. Mandatory military service under martial law is indefinite, unless age limit of 60 (or 65 for higher officers) is reached, or if there are grounds for discharge such as bad health, family circumstances, or prison sentence.

Under the Law "On military duty and military service," all males, subject to limited exemptions were obliged to perform 18 months military service. The Law on Alternative (Non-Military) Service of 1991, later linked with Article 35 of the 1996 Constitution of Ukraine, which prescribes “replacement of military duty with alternative non-military service when compliance with such contradicts religious beliefs of a citizen”, introduced a civilian alternative service for conscientious objectors, but the detailed regulations limited access to members of ten specified religious denominations which were recognised as forbidding their adherents to bear arms.

Immediately following the Russian invasion, two Presidential decrees were issued. Decree 64/2022 declared martial law from 5.30am on 24th February 2022 and limited certain specified constitutional rights (not including those under Article 35). Decree 69/22 started a general mobilisation, under which every person registered for military service and passed as fit by a military medical commission could be called-up for indefinite service until reaching the age of 60 (or 65 for commissioned officers), subject to exemptions and deferrals for family, education or occupational reasons, including employment considered vital for the functioning of the government and economy. No mention was made of exemption for conscientious objectors. Call-up for limited-term military service was cancelled by other subsequent decrees, and this cancelation entailed cessation of accepting applications for alternative service. Mobilisation was further facilitated by a measure prohibiting all males aged between 18 and 60 to leave the country, or to depart without notice from their usual residence.

Mobilisation is conducted by army's territorial recruitment centres (ТЦК), which summon persons liable for military duty to renew their registration records and for medical examination; those who are found fit and benefit from no exemptions or deferrals can be called up immediately, and in some cases have been sent straight to the front line, but more commonly are transported to military training centres. In these centres, those who show unwillingness to serve suffer bullying to accept their fate and take the oath; the Military Commissars commanding the centres can impose administrative fines for non-compliance with mobilisation regulations and can force recruits to sign warnings of criminal liability for draft evasion. As mentioned above, those claiming to be conscientious objectors are assured, sometimes with the help of the local administrations who had been responsible for implementing it, that the Law of Ukraine “On Alternative (Non-Military) Service” does not allow access to such service in wartime. If they persist in their objection, they would be reported to the police on the charge of draft evasion.

In 2023-2024 a clear pattern of repressions against conscientious objectors and peace activists was formed.^[4] At least 24 conscientious objectors have faced criminal cases that have reached court since February 2022, others are under investigation under Article 336 ("Refusing call-up for military service during mobilisation or in a special period, and for military service during call-up of reservists in a special period") of the Criminal Code, which carries a penalty of three to five years imprisonment.

Christian conscientious objectors Vitaliy Alexeienko and Dmytro Zelinsky became prisoners of conscience after their religiously-motivated refusal to serve in the army. Zelinsky was initially acquitted, but then sentenced to three years’ imprisonment after a prosecution appeal. Alexeienko was visited in prison by EBCO President Alexia Tsouni^[5]; his initial conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court^[6] in May 2023 on the grounds that the first instance court had refused to consider arguments of conscience, but on retrial he received a suspended sentence for draft evasion, upheld in March 2024 against his appeal asking for acquittal and a prosecution appeal to replace the suspended sentence with actual incarceration. At the hearings in appellate court Alexeienko reiterated his religiously motivated objection and pledged to defend Ukraine from Russian aggression nonviolently, at his current job of postman, since communication is vital for survival and unity of civil society in Ukraine under attacks. Despite many press releases, the press didn't cover the trial and the court refused to grant a motion for webcast submitted by several international organisations including EBCO. When this report was finalised, we learned that three other conscientious objectors, a Jehovah’s Witness, an Evangelical Christian, and Protestant conscientious objector Serhy Stadnitsky had been sentenced to three year terms of actual imprisonment^[7].

Several other conscientious objectors were sentenced to suspended prison terms.Mykhailo Yavorsky was initially sentenced for actual prison term despite that the court considered his conscientious objection a mitigating factor, the court of appeal in Ivano-Frankivsk changed the verdict to suspended prison term, and Yavosrky has lodged a cassation complaint against his conviction which the Supreme Court rejected on 2 May 2024.

Andrii Vyshnevetsky, a religious objector and member of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement, was denied discharge from military service, and the Supreme Court refused to grant his lawsuit to President Zelensky; after cassation the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court quashed on procedural grounds the inaccurate judgement of first instance and wrote that the judiciary have no powers to compel President Zelensky to act for protection of human right to conscientious objection, to remedy relevant gaps in legislation. The Ukrainian Pacifist Movement complained to the Constitutional Court of Ukraine, which refused to open proceedings.

EBCO Board member Yurii Sheliazhenko suffered a search of his apartment on 3rd August 2023 and has since been living under repeatedly extended house arrest while suffering investigation by the Ukrainian Security Service, on allegations which have so far been made public only that a September 2022 statement which he had issued in the name of the Ukrainian Pacifist Movement ”justified Russian aggression”, even while it explicitly condemned the invasion. His computer and smartphone were seized, and despite a Court ruling have not been returned. The ulterior objective would appear to be disrupting his anti-government activism, including his advocacy of the right to refuse to kill and his legal assistance to conscientious objectors^[8]. The Ministry of Justice of Ukraine has asked the Kyiv Region Administrative Court to prohibit and dissolve an EBCO member, Ukrainian Pacifist Movement.

The enforcement of mobilisation has been accompanied by many irregularities and abuses. In 2021, the UN Human Rights Committee had expressed disquiet of reports of military recruiters illegally seizing people at random in the streets to transport them to recruitment offices; this practice continued under mobilisation in 2022-2024, in some publicly reported cases accompanied by gratuitous violence – beatings and deaths in custody of military recruiters were reported, in one instance the victim of alleged inhumane treatment went on hunger strike and fell into a coma. In many cases people have been recruited with no real medical examination, or completely disregarding their eligibility for exemption. At the same time, corruption was rife, with many recruits paying bribes to be declared unfit or to be given special authorisations to leave the country. In the summer of 2023 President Zelensky dismissed all Military Commissars most of whom had been exposed for personal enrichment or human rights violations. He subsequently fired those to whom they had been responsible – Minister of Defense Reznikov and army's commander General Zaluzhny. However, the new commander General Syrskyi and Minister Umerov adopted the position of their predecessors that reports of human rights violations related to mobilisation and of the unwillingness of some Ukrainians to go to war is "the enemy's narrative" which should be fought fiercely along with "draft evasion."

Harsh enforcement of conscription policies varies from total travel ban for all males in age 18-60 and requirements of military ID to enjoy civil rights, to brutal measures such as forced (in some public cases, scandalously violent) transportation of people from streets to military recruitment centres,^[9] where they could be detained to break their will and sent to the army with no real medical examination, ignoring disabilities and exemptions. Some people detained in military recruitment or training centres died, in one case fell in coma, supposedly after inhuman treatment and hunger strike in protest against arbitrary detention.

Laws were adopted lowering the age of conscription during mobilisation from 27 to 25, giving recruitment centres access to personal records in public databases, allowing them to exert more pressure on those who are not willing to serve.

The Ministry of Defense proposed and the Cabinet of Ministers approved draft laws imposing draconian punishments and civil death for draft evasion; it was received so badly by society that government withdrew one of these laws and proposed another, also raising human rights concerns, but adopted a milder version after President Zelensky's public support. A way in which the army pressed the Parliament to adopt this law could be illustrated by the fact that the Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights Dmytro Lubinets was somehow forced to give up his criticism of absence of alternative service arrangements in the draft mobilisation law after a meeting with a Minister of Defence, though an amendment appeared in the new law giving to parliamentary commissioner personal deferral from conscription, revealing that previously he was vulnerable to possible hidden pressure by threats of conscription, to which his staff remains vulnerable.

The amendments to mobilisation legislation were signed by President Zelensky and expected to come into legal force in May 2024, that envisage obligation of all "subjects to military duty" (men aged 18-60 and women with medical qualifications) to “actualise” military registration, including medical examination, after which you could be sent to army if recognised fit to serve) during the 60 days after publication of the law and to carry at all times military IDs which can be demanded by police, military recruiters or border guard. Failure to comply could entail fine or suspension of driving licence; no conscientious objection exemptions envisaged. The forced transportation of people to recruitment centres is legalised if this is done by the police under order of the military commissar. Consular services for Ukrainians abroad will be provided in case of their military registration. Renewal of passports will not be permitted without military registration and ID, and males are required to return to Ukraine in order to renew their passports.

Also, a draft law hardening penalties for draft dodging was passed in first reading, it criminalises refusal to undergo military medical examination and increases fines for non-compliance with military regulations for a level from 200 to 5000 Euros.

According to the police, warrants are issued for stopping and transportation to recruitment centres of hundreds of thousands of people for failure to perform military duty; similar numbers of draft evaders were stated by officials of the Ministry of Defense. In February 2024, there were 9,400 police investigations of draft evasion cases. Nearly 20,000 men were stopped when trying to cross the border illegally; people risk their lives escaping Ukraine, since the border guard is allowed to shoot fugitives, and 25 men drowned attempting to swim the border river Tisza under water.

Sociological studies show that most Ukrainians believe that unwillingness to serve is a result of fear and lack of proper and just military organisation rather than unwillingness to fight because of religious and psychological reasons; polls show that society disapproves cruelty and corruption related to mobilisation, many people dislike the total travel ban for men and sympathise with those unwilling to serve out of fear of death.

People are rarely ready to openly declare their unwillingness to serve in the army, since it could lead to harsher punishments. For example, despite that in some cases desertion may be motivated by reasons of conscience, we failed to find any explicit public accounts of such sort, though there are informal signs it could be a case in some situations. However, there are many judgments in a public register of court decisions where people claim a right to alternative service or conscientious objection challenging refusals to consider their application for alternative service or defending against criminal and administrative charges in draft evasion, disobedience to commander (when ordered to take oath, to depart to frontline, etc.), non-compliance with military regulations (mostly regarding military registration). Lawyers are mostly not recommending people to claim conscientious objection as defence, even if these people likely have genuine objections based on conscience, because it is not a part of Ukrainian legal culture and even practical matters of alternative service are mostly unknown to lawyers, except for a few working with marginal privileged churches. The media and even human rights organisations ignore persecution of conscientious objectors or shame them as "draft evaders."

Regulations of compulsory military service and alternative non-military service under martial law

Legislation related to discrimination and persecution of conscientious objectors

Number of persons, sentenced by courts for crimes related to evasion of military service in Ukraine^[10]

Number of judgments in administrative offence cases related to evasion of military service in Ukraine^[11]

Army's persistence in holding all men in conscription serfdom has historical grounds. Conscription system in Ukraine was introduced by Russian Empire and cemented by Soviet Union after a short period of allowed exemptions in early years of communist regime, that ended in total repression rooting out all "peace sects." In Soviet Ukraine, like in all republics of Soviet Union, refusal to undergo military service motivated by religious reasons was officially considered as a crime of draft evasion, punishable by incarceration in peacetime and by death penalty during a wartime. Hundreds of patriotic conscientious objections to service in Soviet army were symbolic and brought closer dissolution of the communist empire. After declaration of independence in 1991, a law was adopted on alternative non-military service accessible for members of religious organisations, acting compliant to law, prohibiting use of weapons and military service. The law from the beginning had discriminatory nature, not recognizing conscientious objection as individual right, making alternative service an unpleasant non-qualified work during a term one and half longer than conscription, shaping alternative service as collective right of very marginal denominations allowed to exist in legal field as long as local civil and military administration tolerates them, the discretion frequently used to make shady arrangements and extort bribes. With Russian annexation of Crimea and proxy war in eastern Ukraine, in 2014 special period was proclaimed and conscription by mobilisation was started, when conscientious objectors faced non-recognition, some of them managed to uphold their rights in courts. Since term-limited conscription continued at that time, some young believers were allowed to replace it with alternative service. According to 2021 EBCO Annual Report, on the eve of Russian full-scale invasion there were 1659 legally recognised conscientious objectors, but that number quickly dropped because alternative service was suspended along with a term-limited conscription and the military recruiters pushed for mobilisation of believers.

Despite Article 35 of the Constitution of Ukraine envisages right to alternative service, it is interpreted by the army in light of law on alternative service which allows to "limit right to alternative service in special time," i.e. deny the right under martial law. Constitutionality of such position and the law on alternative service itself are doubtful, but courts usually accept it. According to opinion of judge German Anisimov, secretary of third chamber of criminal court of cassation in the Supreme Court, expressed at webinar for judges of lower courts and published on official website of the Supreme Court, right to alternative service could be limited under martial law and people who declare religious beliefs could be prosecuted for draft evasion under Article 336 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine^[12]. Ukraine is a party to International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), both require legal guarantees for conscientious objection to military service which is a human right non-derogable in wartime, but Ukraine never faced serious international pressure for lack of compliance with these human rights obligations. In the past years, as EBCO reported, UN Human Rights Committee and Council of Europe several times recommended Ukraine to guarantee fully and equitably human right to conscientious objection to military service, with no serious effect.

2023 annual report of Ukrainian Parliament Human Rights Commissioner^[13] indicates numerous violations in the context of conscription, including complaints regarding the mobilisation of citizens who, according to the requirements of Article 35 of the Constitution, should be exempted from military service due to religious beliefs, since such exemption during a war is not regulated by the Law of Ukraine "On Alternative (Non-Military) Service". Seventh-day Adventist Church, Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Church of Evangelical Christian Baptists, whose creed does not allow the use of weapons, repeatedly requested the Commissioner to protect freedom of religion from violations of the rights of clergy and members of religious communities by recruitment centres, who treat them punitively as regular draft evaders. Officials of the recruitment centres explain their actions by absence of legal procedure implementing the right to alternative service, guaranteed by the Constitution of Ukraine, in conditions of martial law. The Commissioner raised the issue before the Committee of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on National Security, Defense and Intelligence regarding the need to make appropriate changes to the legislation. After a series of public requests Ukrainian Pacifist Movement learned that the Commissioner's proposals were disseminated among the members of the committee and sent to Cabinet of Ministers where a Vice Prime Minister instructed Ministry of Defense in communication with the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience (DESS) with Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Economy, and Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organisations to work on question of alternative service for clergy and believers. Ministry of Defense objected against any changes in current legislation which, in MoD interpretation, does not allow conscientious objection, and stated its interest in avoiding of "abuses of right to alternative service" and in providing alternative service within the army, like job of chaplains for clergy, or non-combatant duties (like kitchen and cleaning) for regular believers. The Ministry of Internal Affairs also objected, pointing out that alternative service increases risks of draft evasion, and the Ministry of Economy suggested using a procedure of reservation of employees of vital strategic enterprises to a limited number of clergy chosen by the DESS. Then the question was worked through regarding a number of people eligible for alternative service according to the 1999 list of privileged confessions approved by the government, and it appeared that such number is near 60,000. When this report was concluded, responsible ministries and agencies claimed that they continue communication and consideration of question of alternative service under martial law, prioritising prevention of "abuses" by some sort of undisclosed "algorithm of actions," but all the respondents emphasised that they don't plan to draft in 2024 a legislation filling the gap in matters of alternative service or conscientious objection, at the same time denying that discriminatory measures towards conscientious objectors are planned under pretext of "fighting abuses." Last responses to public information requests from the parliamentary commissioner for human rights and DESS suggest that their proposals to include alternative service provisions into mobilisation legislation were rejected by lawmakers, and no further efforts are seemingly planned to guarantee right to conscientious objection under martial law.