Ukraine Lowers Conscription Age to 25 to Plug Shortfall in Troop Numbers Fighting Russia 

Ukrainian servicemen drive in a military vehicle on a road near the town of Chasiv Yar, Donetsk region, amid Russia's invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
Ukrainian servicemen drive in a military vehicle on a road near the town of Chasiv Yar, Donetsk region, amid Russia's invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
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Ukraine Lowers Conscription Age to 25 to Plug Shortfall in Troop Numbers Fighting Russia 

Ukrainian servicemen drive in a military vehicle on a road near the town of Chasiv Yar, Donetsk region, amid Russia's invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
Ukrainian servicemen drive in a military vehicle on a road near the town of Chasiv Yar, Donetsk region, amid Russia's invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)

Ukraine on Wednesday lowered the military conscription age from 27 to 25 in an effort to replenish its depleted ranks after more than two years of war following Russia’s full-scale invasion.

The new mobilization law came into force a day after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed it. Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, passed it last year.

It was not immediately clear why Zelenskyy took so long to sign the measure into law. He didn’t make any public comment about it, and officials did not say how many new soldiers the country expected to gain or for which units.

Conscription has been a sensitive matter in Ukraine for many months amid a growing shortage of infantry on top of a severe ammunition shortfall that has handed Russia the battlefield initiative. Russia’s own problems with manpower and planning have so far prevented it from taking full advantage of its edge.

The average age of Ukrainian soldiers, like those on the Russian side, is around 40, military analysts say. Some Ukrainians worry that taking young adults out of the workforce will backfire by further harming the war-ravaged economy, but the problem reportedly has become acute as Kyiv girds for an expected summer offensive by the Kremlin’s forces.

Zelenskyy has rarely mentioned the mobilization issue, and parliament has held long and inconclusive debates about it in recent months.

Last December, Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s military wanted to mobilize up to 500,000 more troops. But he said he had asked the top brass to spell out the details on what is “a very sensitive matter” before deciding whether to grant their wish.

Such a major mobilization would cost Ukraine the equivalent of $13.4 billion, Zelenskyy said at the time. Other aspects to be considered include whether troops currently on the front would be rotated or allowed home leave, he said.

The need for a broad mobilization to beef up the number of Ukrainian troops reportedly was one of the areas of disagreement between Zelenskyy and Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the popular commander in chief of Ukraine’s armed forces whom the president replaced in February.

Ukrainian Defense Ministry statistics say the Ukrainian military had nearly 800,000 troops in October. That doesn’t include National Guard or other units. In total, 1 million Ukrainians are in uniform.



Bangladesh Protest Leaders Taken from Hospital by Police

People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
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Bangladesh Protest Leaders Taken from Hospital by Police

People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)

Bangladeshi police detectives on Friday forced the discharge from hospital of three student protest leaders blamed for deadly unrest, taking them to an unknown location, staff told AFP.

Nahid Islam, Asif Mahmud and Abu Baker Majumder are all members of Students Against Discrimination, the group responsible for organizing this month's street rallies against civil service hiring rules.

At least 195 people were killed in the ensuing police crackdown and clashes, according to an AFP count of victims reported by police and hospitals, in some of the worst unrest of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's tenure.

All three were patients at a hospital in the capital Dhaka, and at least two of them said their injuries were caused by torture in earlier police custody.

"They took them from us," Gonoshasthaya hospital supervisor Anwara Begum Lucky told AFP. "The men were from the Detective Branch."

She added that she had not wanted to discharge the student leaders but police had pressured the hospital chief to do so.

Islam's elder sister Fatema Tasnim told AFP from the hospital that six plainclothes detectives had taken all three men.

The trio's student group had suspended fresh protests at the start of this week, saying they had wanted the reform of government job quotas but not "at the expense of so much blood".

The pause was due to expire earlier on Friday but the group had given no indication of its future course of action.

Islam, 26, the chief coordinator of Students Against Discrimination, told AFP from his hospital bed on Monday that he feared for his life.

He said that two days beforehand, a group of people identifying themselves as police detectives blindfolded and handcuffed him and took him to an unknown location.

Islam added that he had come to his senses the following morning on a roadside in Dhaka.

Mahmud earlier told AFP that he had also been detained by police and beaten at the height of last week's unrest.

Three senior police officers in Dhaka all denied that the trio had been taken from the hospital and into custody on Friday.

- Garment tycoon arrested -

Police told AFP on Thursday that they had arrested at least 4,000 people since the unrest began last week, including 2,500 in Dhaka.

On Friday police said they had arrested David Hasanat, the founder and chief executive of one of Bangladesh's biggest garment factory enterprises.

His Viyellatex Group employs more than 15,000 people according to its website, and its annual turnover was estimated at $400 million by the Daily Star newspaper last year.

Dhaka Metropolitan Police inspector Abu Sayed Miah said Hasanat and several others were suspected of financing the "anarchy, arson and vandalism" of last week.

Bangladesh makes around $50 billion in annual export earnings from the textile trade, which services leading global brands including H&M, Gap and others.

Student protests began this month after the reintroduction in June of a scheme reserving more than half of government jobs for certain candidates.

With around 18 million young people in Bangladesh out of work, according to government figures, the move deeply upset graduates facing an acute jobs crisis.

Critics say the quota is used to stack public jobs with loyalists to Hasina's Awami League.

- 'Call to the nation' -

The Supreme Court cut the number of reserved jobs on Sunday but fell short of protesters' demands to scrap the quotas entirely.

Hasina has ruled Bangladesh since 2009 and won her fourth consecutive election in January after a vote without genuine opposition.

Her government is also accused by rights groups of misusing state institutions to entrench its hold on power and stamp out dissent, including the extrajudicial killing of opposition activists.

Hasina continued a tour of government buildings that had been ransacked by protesters, on Friday visiting state broadcaster Bangladesh Television, which was partly set ablaze last week.

"Find those who were involved in this," she said, according to state news agency BSS.

"Cooperate with us to ensure their punishment. I am making this call to the nation."