A Moscow department head dies a few days after being drafted to the front in Ukraine. The news triggers a mass exodus from the capital's administration. Up to 30 percent of the male employees are said to have already left their homeland.
According to a media report, officials from the Moscow city administration and federal authorities in the Russian capital are fleeing the partial mobilization in the country. "In some departments of the Moscow City Administration, the number of male employees who left Russia amounts to 20 to 30 percent of all employees," reports the Internet portal "Vyorstka". IT specialists in particular left the country for the Central Asian ex-Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, it said.
The background to this is that many civil servants, especially at the lower administrative level, are not protected from being called up as "essential" cadres. The death of a department head from Moscow City Hall in Ukraine a few days after the Russian partial mobilization not only made national headlines, but also caused panic among his colleagues. According to the report, the flight movement has led to work being paralyzed in several departments. The housing administration, the health department and the education department are given as examples. The shortage of staff should also be noticeable in institutions that are subordinate to federal ministries.
The political and military leadership in Moscow has promised several categories of Russian citizens that they will be exempted from conscription. IT specialists are actually one of them, but the proof is associated with bureaucratic obstacles. Officially, the Russian authorities have not commented on the report of officers fleeing.
Russian President Vladimir Putin put the number of recruits at 220,000 in mid-October. The planned number of 300,000 will be reached in two weeks. However, data from Russian registry offices suggests that almost half a million men in Russia were mobilized for the war against Ukraine. The Russian exile news site Mediazona reported on Monday. The alleged partial mobilization of up to 300,000 recruits would thus be significantly more extensive than claimed by the Russian leadership.
According to the report, those who have been mobilized in Russia can get married immediately instead of having to wait a month. The mobilization triggered a wedding boom in Russia: a soldier's widow receives compensation, but her girlfriend does not. Hospital visits are also easier for married people. From the wedding dates from 75 Russian regions, Mediazona concluded that at least 492,000 people were mobilized in Russia by mid-October.
