The Verkhovna Rada may introduce a bill next week on the possibility of mobilizing convicts, Justice Minister Denys Malyuska announced in a telethon on the evening of March 9.
According to him, there are “thousands of prisoners and convicts” who are ready to become military personnel.
Malyuska also noted that, at the request of the military, the draft law excluded the possibility of mobilizing those convicts who violated military discipline, committed crimes related to the performance of their military duty, or committed crimes against statehood. In addition, he noted that not all commanders are ready to accept convicts into their units.
"We will not and do not plan to impose such mobilized servicemen on anyone. Perhaps these will be separate units. But in any case, only commanders who understand who they will be dealing with and how to work with this will receive the appropriate units," Malyuska explained.
The minister emphasized that the final word will be with the parliament, which, according to him, could adopt the bill by the end of spring.
Regarding previous events:
In February, the Ministry of Justice announced that it planned to propose “more radical” measures regarding the mobilization of convicts. In addition, the department announced that it was working on the issue of the mobilization of prisoners.
This happened after the Verkhovna Rada supported the updated government bill No. 10449 on military service, mobilization, and military registration in the first reading.
In general, the new law provides for the following innovations:
- if a serviceman has been in continuous service for 36 months, this will be grounds for dismissal. The bill also provides for changing the conscription age from 27 to 25 years;
- people will not need to go to the CCC to update their data. This can be done online in their personal account or at the ASC;
- after mobilization, all citizens will undergo mandatory military training for 2-3 months. The government emphasizes that people cannot be sent to the front immediately after mobilization;
- It is assumed that the cash benefit will be at least 20 thousand hryvnias per month, excluding additional remuneration, which for the period of martial law is from 30 to 100 thousand hryvnias.
In addition, the new bill proposes to voluntarily call up convicts who have been released from probationary sentences for military service.
However, deputies submitted over four thousand amendments, both manually and electronically. As a result, according to Roman Kostenko, secretary of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence, the bill may ultimately undergo significant changes.
