On Thursday, December 21, it became known that the Minister of Defense of Ukraine Rustem Umerov, in an interview with German publications, said that Ukrainian men aged 25-60 years living in Germany and other countries should report to the conscription centers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine next year, otherwise sanctions will be applied to them. This statement by the minister was later denied by the Ministry of Defense. What is behind Umerov’s statement and why his department backed down
Claims and reality
“Ukrainians living in Germany and fit for military service must strengthen the Ukrainian army next year. According to the Minister of Defense, sanctions will be applied to those who do not comply with this requirement,” writes the German publication Welt.
“We are still discussing what will happen if they don’t come voluntarily,” Umerov said.
The Minister of Defense of Ukraine made a similar statement against the backdrop of a statement by President Zelensky, who at a press conference on December 19 called mobilization a “sensitive issue” and noted that from 450 to 500 thousand people need to be mobilized into the army.
According to Umerov, justice is important here.
This is not the first time that the question of how to bring back men of military age from abroad has arisen. It also rose under Minister Alexei Reznikov. And the Verkhovna Rada even prepared a bill on the forced return to the country of all men who fled abroad from the general mobilization. However, this bill was never adopted after heated discussion in the media and social networks.
The only thing that the authorities managed to do was to adopt Cabinet Resolution N1487 of December 30, 2022, according to which Ukrainian embassies and consulates must keep military records of conscripts, those liable for military service, reservists, and also inform Ukrainians abroad about the beginning of a new conscription and mobilization, and also “facilitate” their return home.
In reality, it was not possible to implement what was written in the resolution. As lawyers note, Ukrainians can register with a consular office only voluntarily.
“Employees of diplomatic institutions will theoretically be able to inform about the conscription, but they are not obliged and do not have the right to serve summonses to those liable for military service,” lawyer Rostislav Kravets noted in a commentary to Apostrophe, “Also, there is no clear mechanism for “facilitating the return of those liable for military service and reservists to Ukraine,” and men can be deported only by decision of a court of a foreign state.”
Human rights activist and lawyer Nikolai Golbin noted in a comment that extradition is applied only if a certain crime has been committed, and even then, this is not easy to do.
“How many Ukrainian officials convicted of crimes in Ukraine have been extradited over the past 5 years? Not a single one. Because the extradition mechanism is very complicated, and it’s unrealistic,” says the lawyer.
But according to Golbin, Ukrainians who went abroad cannot be automatically labeled as criminals.
“People who went to Europe have a certain status. They are under the protection of the state where they are located. People fled the war and forcing a person to return back to a country where there is a war is prohibited by international conventions. No state will give permission for this,” Golbin said.
Regarding the application of sanctions, the lawyer noted the following: “In order to force a citizen of Ukraine to come to the consular office, you can simply block access to government resources or bank cards, as was done in 2014 in relation to people who received pensions in Donetsk or Lugansk. If such an order is issued from the National Bank - and the location of the cards is determined - then a big scandal will begin.”
According to the lawyer, people who make such statements either do not know the norms of international law or are simply hype.
“The majority of Ukrainians who went abroad, both before the full-scale invasion and after it, live in the legal field of the country where they went,” says political scientist Viktor Nebozhenko in a commentary to Apostrophe, “And the statements of the Minister of Defense are irresponsible. And that's bad."
American trail and reverse
Literally immediately after the media published a statement by Rustem Umerov about the possible application of sanctions to men who do not want to voluntarily return to Ukraine from abroad, information appeared that the children of the Minister of Defense of Ukraine live in America and have American citizenship.
The Ministry of Defense responded to this news and called some of the information fake.
“The information disseminated in the media that members of the family of Defense Minister Rustem Umerov are allegedly US citizens is not true. The minister’s children (son - 10 years old, daughters - 8 and 2 years old) are exclusively citizens of Ukraine. The Umerov family has no citizenship of other countries,” the military department wrote.
At the same time, however, the Ministry of Defense confirmed that in 2016, the family of the current minister “was forced to go abroad due to attacks and threats as a result of Rustem Umerov’s systemic activities to de-occupy temporarily occupied Crimea.”
And even later, the Ministry of Defense clarified the words spoken by Umerov, and, in fact, backed off. “There are no discussions about conscription into the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine from abroad,” the Ministry of Defense wrote.
In a commentary, the head of the press and information department of the Ministry of Defense, Illarion Pavlyuk, explained that it was the media that allegedly shifted their focus.
“In general, they talked about recruiting and the need to convey to Ukrainians abroad how important it is for them to join the army,” Pavlyuk noted.
“I would not connect the denial of the Ministry of Defense with information about the American trace of the Umerov family. This is different. The minister made a rash statement and now the Ministry of Defense is trying to smooth it over,” says Viktor Nebozhenko.
According to Viktor Nebozhenko, Rustem Umerov should take up other activities.
“And the president should entrust mobilization and recruitment to the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the effective head of his Office,” the political scientist concluded.
