Over 20,000 Russians prosecuted for refusing to fight in Ukraine. Russia sees a wave of military refusal, with Ukraine not far behind

More than three years after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, military courts across the country have registered over 20,000 criminal cases against soldiers accused of refusing to serve, according to court data compiled by Mediazona.

The majority of these prosecutions, a total of 18,159 cases, fall under Article 337 of the Russian Criminal Code, which deals with unauthorised absence from a military unit. Since the start of “partial mobilisation” in 2022, legal amendments have increased the maximum penalty to ten years in prison.

A further 1,369 cases involve charges under Article 332 for disobeying a direct order. This is a lighter offence and carries a maximum sentence of three years. Another 1,010 soldiers have been charged with desertion under Article 338, which is punishable by up to 15 years in prison.

Following record numbers in 2024, military investigators and prosecutors have once again returned to peak activity. By spring 2025, courts across Russia were receiving around 1,000 new cases every month. Judges have been handing down convictions at a rate of between 700 and 800 each month. In April 2025 alone, military courts issued 848 verdicts, which averages to 38 decisions for every working day. This is slightly more than the average monthly rate from the previous year.

In total, by the end of May 2025, Russian military courts had received criminal cases against 20,662 men related to refusal to serve. Out of these, 17,721 had already received their convictions.

A similar trend is unfolding in Ukraine. According to data from the Office of the Prosecutor General, investigative authorities have reported between 15,000 and 20,000 new cases per month since December 2024.

Despite these large numbers, only a few hundred cases each month result in formal charges being submitted to court. Of those that do go to trial, two-thirds are accompanied by requests from prosecutors to exempt the accused from criminal liability.

“This pattern, where only a small proportion of cases actually reach court, is typical in Ukraine,” defence lawyer Ilya Novikov told Mediazona. “Many cases are opened automatically and, until charges are formally brought, they do not usually pose a real problem for the person involved.”

Novikov added that the rise in case numbers is not purely procedural. “Some soldiers use an unauthorised absence charge as a way of requesting a transfer to another unit, which would not be allowed in normal circumstances. And in general, the way people are treated plays a role as well.”

Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office never published statistics on crimes against military service. In 2023, it stopped reporting the number of criminal cases initiated altogether. Because of this, a complete comparison between Russia and Ukraine is not possible.

Between January and May 2025, Russian courts received 4,350 new cases related to refusal to serve. Over the same period, Ukrainian courts received 2,355.