War

One thousand two hundred and fifty-second day. Ukraine allowed to send people over 60 years old to war

Since February 24, 2022, Meduza has been broadcasting live about the Russian-Ukrainian war. We publish your letters in our daily materials because we are sure that we need to continue talking about the war. How do you feel about the ongoing war? How is it affecting you personally right now? How has your attitude to what is happening, to Russia, to Ukraine, to the world changed over these three years of war? Find the feedback form at the end of this article. A review of the previous day can be read here .

Shelling. Main

• In the Zaporozhye region, a correctional colony came under fire from Russian troops - the blow was caused by four guided aerial bombs. As a result, 17 people were killed and another 42 were injured.
• As a result of an attack by Ukrainian drones, a fire occurred at a railway station in the city of Salsk in the Rostov region, and a passenger train was damaged. No one was injured, traffic was suspended, and several long-distance trains were delayed.

Ukraine

Zelensky allowed men over 60 to enter into contracts

President of Ukraine Vladimir Zelensky signed a law allowing citizens of the country who have reached the age of 60 to sign contracts with the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

The Verkhovna Rada adopted the law on July 16. The signing of such contracts will be voluntary.

Even before the adoption of the law, the Verkhovna Rada emphasized that its mass application was not planned, and the opportunity to conclude contracts would be provided only for a limited number of specialists.

As Fyodor Venislavsky, a member of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, explained , the authorities do not plan to allow “massive entry into the service of former colonels and lieutenant colonels after 60 years,” since the purpose of concluding a contract for them can only be to receive payments for recalculating their pensions. Therefore, he emphasized, each application will be considered individually - men over 60 years old will not be able to simply come and sign a contract.

“Only those citizens who will be recognized as fit for military service and who are really needed by the security and defense sector will be recruited for service […]. The decision will be made solely at the discretion of the military leadership - and only at the highest level, in order to prevent possible abuses,” the deputy assured.

In Ukraine, the issue of shortage of military personnel is acute. Due to the lack of volunteers, teams of TCC employees are looking for men liable for military service throughout the country and forcefully sending them to the front. In April 2024, the mobilization age was lowered from 27 to 25 years. The authorities continue to discuss whether the mobilization age should be lowered further.

Russia

Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service said the US and UK allegedly discussed replacing Zelensky

The press bureau of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service stated that in “one of the Alpine resort towns” the United States and Great Britain allegedly organized a secret meeting where they elected a new president of Ukraine.

According to the SVR, at the meeting “the prospects of replacing Zelensky as head of the Kyiv regime were discussed,” and all its participants agreed that this “issue is long overdue.”

In addition to representatives of the United States and Great Britain (who exactly represented these two countries is not specified), the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Andrey Ermak and the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate Kirill Budanov allegedly took part in the meeting. Based on its results, it was decided to nominate the former commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhny, to the post of President of Ukraine.

“Ermak and Budanov “took it up.” At the same time, they secured promises from the Anglo-Saxons to retain their current posts, and also to take their interests into account when resolving other personnel issues,” the SVR stated.

In January 2024, the head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, Sergei Naryshkin, said that the United States, “as part of the line of total vassalization,” moved to form a colonial administration in Ukraine, which would consist of “Ukrainians trained in the West who swore allegiance to American interests.” Naryshkin claimed that in order to free up posts for these people, Zelensky was required to fire dozens of high-ranking members of his team under the threat of a “killer corruption dossier.”

In May 2024, Naryshkin claimed that the entire Ukrainian elite was already “being maintained by the United States.” “Decisions on negotiations, offensives or a truce are made not in Kyiv, but in Washington,” said the head of the Foreign Intelligence Service.

The SVR has been talking about the fact that the United States is allegedly “increasingly” discussing Zelensky’s replacement at least since December 2023. At various times, among the candidates, in addition to Zaluzhny, Budanov and Ermak, according to the Russian intelligence service, allegedly included former adviser to the presidential office Aleksey Arestovich, the head of Kyiv Vitaliy Klitschko, and the former head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov.

Updated . The State Intelligence Service of Ukraine called the SVR message an “information operation.” Ukrainian intelligence said that in this way Moscow wants to “switch public attention from the topic of war to the topic of elections, provoke discord and reduce Ukraine’s ability to resist the occupiers.”

War through the eyes of Meduza readers

How we choose letters

Meduza's readers live in different countries and have different attitudes towards the war. We publish your letters to see this event through your eyes. Our editors try to present all points of view, even if they do not coincide with the editorial position. However, in accordance with the Meduza code, we do not publish messages that contain “hate speech,” justify the murder of civilians, or express direct support for an aggressive war.

Maxim (St. Petersburg). I often think about how trusting many Russian citizens are in state propaganda. My mind is truly torn by how much her theses go against basic logic. The first country in the world by area (and the 12th from the bottom in terms of population density), suffering from demographic problems (among which one of the first is early male mortality), lays down more than two hundred thousand men killed (this does not count the wounded and those who left) in order to add to its 17 million square kilometers of (mostly unkempt and uninhabited) territory another hundred or two thousand squares of mine-filled ruins! To start something like this, you have to be a truly great strategist. To believe in the reasonableness of such a decision, one must completely lose critical thinking.

I look at the damaged regional roads (I have to travel a lot for work), at rural schools and hospitals that have long since exhausted their resources and are in urgent need of repair. How many good and useful things could have been done with that money and those people who were and will be spent on the war! It’s simply unthinkable how you can continue to drive on a broken dirt road, study and receive treatment in terrible conditions, observe endless rows of fresh graves in rural cemeteries and continue to believe that as a result of the SVO we gain some kind of greatness, achieve some kind of sovereignty or - what else will these demagogues on the state salary come up with? And people who believe in this heresy are all around me. It's simply mind boggling.

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