Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs a video conference meeting on the draft of the 2024 federal budget and the planning period of 2025 and 2026 at the Kremlin in Moscow on September 18, 2023
Russia's fall draft begins October 1 and seeks to call up 130,000 new soldiers to fight in the war
The Kyiv Independent reported eligible men from occupied regions of Ukraine will be drafted
Russia's Defense Ministry announced Friday that its upcoming conscription campaign will for the first time include eligible men from four occupied regions in Ukraine
The Russian draft, beginning October 1 and running through the end of the year, seeks to call 130,000 new soldiers to service, according to the Russian state media outlet, TASS
Russian men aged 18-27 are required to enlist for a year of mandatory military service
The fall draft will, for the first time, include residents of occupied territory in Ukraine including Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, the Kyiv Independent reported
Putin announced the annexation of the four regions last September after holding elections regarded by Ukraine and its Western allies as "shams," per CNN
While the territories are currently held by Russian forces, allegiances among the residents who remain in the regions are divided between Ukrainian loyalists and those who support the Russian regime, France24 reported
Russia passed a law raising the upper age limit of the draft to 30 years old to broaden its pool of prospective soldiers, but the change will not go into effect until January 2024
Russia also increased the maximum age for veteran reservists to be called back to fight, making the country's highest-ranking officers eligible for mobilization as old as 70