ukrainian police conducted nationwide raids on draft dodger gangs on friday as the country battles to generate enough conscripted soldiers to keep its military competitive in the war against russia without radically widening recruitment criteria. the national police of ukraine said they conducted over 200 searches of gangs assisting illegal border crossings by adult ukrainian males, who have been banned from leaving the country since the beginning of russias invasion in 2022. the searches at the premises of persons involved in illegal transactions took place in 19 of 27 ukrainian regions, police said friday. according to the afp news agency, the raids against draft dodging-enabling gangs followed searches of 600 addresses last week.   25/01/18/ukrainian-police-raid-draf t-dodgers-in-nationwide-conscriptio n-searches/ in a statement, ukraines police said draft-dodging crimes are committed through fraud, forgery of documents, unauthorized interference in the operation of electronic registers, and bribery of officials. announcing the latest raids, ukraines police published images, including one anonymised picture [top] of officers wearing police and cyberpolice department patches on their coats accompanying fatigue-wearing armed officers of the national polices special patrol unit. while ukraine has over a million men in its conscription army, thousands of nationals have evaded call-up orders or registration on the national database. as previously reported in 2023, 20,000 military-aged men were known to have illegally crossed ukraines borders by that point to flee abroad.
Democrat