Russiaʼs Permanent Representative to the UN Vasily Nebenzya stated that the Kremlin is not currently planning a mass mobilization.
He told this to journalists in New York, Ukrinform reports.
"Donʼt worry about mobilization in Russia. Officially, it has been stated many times that we donʼt need mass mobilization at the moment, and it is not planned or expected, as far as I know," Nebenzya said.
At the same time, he added: "Weʼll see what happens after the elections — and whoʼs right and whoʼs wrong."
Nebenzia also denied that "tens of thousands of young Russians" had begun to leave en masse for Georgia on the eve of the expected mobilization after the so-called State Duma elections.
Meanwhile, the Russian Federal Customs Service reported on August 19 a "record passenger flow" at the checkpoint in Verkhny Lars, on the Russian-Georgian border. Almost 40 000 Russians crossed it in a few days.
- On August 11, President Volodymyr Zelensky, after the GUR report, said that the Kremlin plans to conduct a rapid additional mobilization of several hundred thousand Russians this fall, after the so-called parliamentary elections, and the same number next year.
- Before that, in an interview with Sky News, Zelensky said that Putin expects to mobilize from 300 to 500 thousand people in the fall.
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