KYIV, Ukraine (AP) \u2014 Russia\u2019s rush to mobilize hundreds of thousands of recruits to staunch stinging losses in Ukraine is a tacit acknowledgement that its \u201carmy is not able to fight,\u201d Ukraine\u2019s president said Sunday, as splits sharpened in Europe over whether to welcome or turn away Russians fleeing the call-up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking to U.S. broadcaster CBS, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also said he\u2019s bracing for more Russian strikes on Ukraine\u2019s electrical infrastructure, as the Kremlin seeks to ramp up the pressure on Ukraine and its Western backers as the weather gets colder. Zelenskyy warned that this winter \u201cwill be very difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey will shoot missiles, and they will target our electric grid. This is a challenge, but we are not afraid of that.\u201d he said on \u201cFace the Nation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He portrayed the Russian mobilization \u2014 its first such call-up since World War II \u2014 as a signal of weakness, not strength, saying: \u201cThey admitted that their army is not able to fight with Ukraine anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Zelenskyy also said Ukraine has received NASAMS air defense systems from the U.S. NASAMS uses surface-to-air missiles to track and shoot down incoming missiles or aircraft. Zelenskyy did not say how many Ukraine received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although the European Union is now largely off limits to most Russians, with direct flights stopped and its land borders increasingly closed to them, an exodus of Russian men fleeing military service is creating divisions among European officials over whether they should be granted safe haven.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The partial mobilization is also\u00a0triggering protests\u00a0in Russia, with new anti-war demonstrations on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Dagestan, one of Russia\u2019s poorer regions in the North Caucasus, police fired warning shots to try to disperse more than 100 people who blocked a highway while protesting Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s military call-up, Russian media reported.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dozens of women chanted \u201cNo to war!\u201d in the Dagestani capital of Makhachkala on Sunday. Videos of the protests showed women in head scarves chasing police away from the rally and standing in front of police cars carrying detained protesters, demanding their release.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Women also protested in the Siberian city of Yakutsk, chanting \u201cNo to genocide!\u201d and marching in a circle around police, who later dragged some away or forced them into police vans, according to videos shared by Russian media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At least 2,000 people have been arrested in recent days for similar demonstrations around Russia. Many of those taken away have immediately received a call-up summons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Unconfirmed Russian media reports that the Kremlin might soon close Russian borders to men of fighting age are fueling panic and prompting more to flee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Zelenskyy in his nightly address on Sunday described Russia\u2019s mobilization as \u201ccriminal\u201d and reiterated his call for Russians to stand up to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFight so that they don\u2019t send your children to die, all of those who they can take in this criminal Russian mobilization,\u201d Zelenskyy said, switching to Russian for a brief portion of his speech. \u201cBecause if you come to take the lives of our children, I will tell you as a father \u2014 we will not let you go alive.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
German officials have voiced a desire to help Russian men deserting military service and have called for a European-wide solution. Germany has held out the possibility of granting asylum to deserters and those refusing the draft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In France, senators are arguing that Europe has a duty to help and warned that not granting refuge to fleeing Russians could play into Putin\u2019s hands, feeding his narrative of Western hostility to Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cClosing our frontiers would fit neither with our values nor our interests,\u201d a group of more than 40 French senators said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet other EU countries are adamant that asylum shouldn\u2019t be offered to Russian men fleeing now \u2014 when the war has moved into its eighth month. They include Lithuania, which borders Kaliningrad, a Russian Baltic Sea exclave. Its foreign minister, Gabrielius Landsbergis, tweeted: \u201cRussians should stay and fight. Against Putin.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
His counterpart in Latvia, also an EU member bordering Russia, said the exodus poses \u201cconsiderable security risks\u201d for the 27-nation bloc and that those fleeing now can\u2019t be considered conscientious objectors since they did not act when Russia invaded Ukraine in February.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many \u201cwere fine with killing Ukrainians, they did not protest then,\u201d the Latvian foreign minister, Edgars Rinkevics, tweeted. He added that they still have \u201cplenty of countries outside EU to go.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Finland also said it intends to \u201csignificantly restrict\u201d entry to Russians entering the EU through its border with Russia. A Finnish opposition leader, Petteri Orpo, said fleeing Russian military reservists were an \u201cobvious\u201d security risk and \u201cwe must put our national security first.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Russia is pressing on with\u00a0its call-up\u00a0of hundreds of thousands of men, seeking to reverse recent losses. Without control of the skies over Ukraine, Russia is also making increasing use of suicide drones from Iran, with more strikes reported Sunday in the Black Sea port city of Odesa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For Ukrainian and Russian military planners, the clock is ticking, with the approach of winter expected to make fighting much more complicated. Already, rainy weather is bringing muddy conditions that are starting to limit the mobility of tanks and other heavy weapons, the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the think-tank said Ukrainian forces are still gaining ground in their counteroffensive, launched in late August, that has rolled back the Russian occupation across large areas of the northeast and which also prompted Putin\u2019s new drive for reinforcements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Kremlin said its initial aim is to add about 300,000 troops to its invasion force, which is struggling with equipment losses, mounting casualties and weakening morale. The mobilization marks a sharp shift from Putin\u2019s previous efforts to portray the war as a limited military operation that wouldn\u2019t interfere with most Russians\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The mobilization is running hand-in-hand with Kremlin-orchestrated votes in four occupied regions of Ukraine that could pave the way for their imminent annexation by Russia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ukraine and its Western allies say the referendums in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions in the south and the eastern Luhansk and Donetsk regions have no legal validity, not least because many tens of thousands of their people have fled. They also call them a \u201csham.\u201d Some footage has shown armed Russian troops going door-to-door to pressure Ukrainians into voting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The voting ends Tuesday and there\u2019s little doubt it will be declared a success by the Russian occupiers. The main questions then will be how soon Putin\u2019s regime will annex the four regions and how that will complicate the war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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