Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Tuesday that the recruits were undergoing training at 80 firing ranges before being deployed to the front lines in Ukraine, where Russian forces are on the retreat in some areas.
President Vladimir Putin ordered the mobilization on Sept. 21 to beef up his troops in Ukraine.
Shoigu previously said that up to 300,000 reservists were to be called up for service, but Putin’s order left open the possibility of an even larger recruitment effort. Some Russian media have speculated that the military plans to call up 1 million reservists or more.
The mobilization sparked protests in many areas across Russia and drove tens of thousands of men to flee Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has formally ruled out talks with Russia following its illegal annexation of Ukrainian territories.
Zelenskyy’s decree released Tuesday declares that holding negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin has become impossible after his decision to annex four regions of Ukraine. The decree enacted a decision by Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council to bolster Ukrainian defenses and seek more weapons from the country’s Western allies in response to Moscow’s move.
Russia’s upper house of parliament on Tuesday ratified the treaties that make the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions of Ukraine part of Russia. Putin is expected to sign their official adhesion later in the day, completing the annexation.
The Kremlin responded to Zelenskyy by saying that it will wait for Ukraine to sit down for talks on ending the conflict, noting that it may not happen until a new Ukrainian president takes office.
ANKARA, Turkey — Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Yevhen Perebyinis has called for the deployment of more weapons from Western allies to Ukraine following the partial mobilization of reserve troops announcement by Russia.
In a video address to a conference in Turkey’s capital on Russia’s war against Ukraine on Tuesday, Perebyinis said the additional weapons would not lead to an escalation but help to end the war sooner.
“We need additional long-range artillery and ammunition, combat aircrafts, and armed vehicles to continue the liberation of the occupied territories,” the deputy minister said. “We need anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense systems to secure our civilians and critical infrastructure from the terrorist attacks on the Russian forces.”
Perebyinis said: “such assistance doesn’t lead to escalation; it will only bring the end of the war closer. The sooner Ukraine receives weapons, the sooner the war will be over and more lives of Ukrainians will be saved.”
Western weapons have helped Ukraine launch a counterattack that has forced a Russian retreat from some previously conquered terrain.