Russia legalizes recruitment of offenders for military service

Russia has legalized the recruitment of criminals for military service in Ukraine and is luring them to the front with the prospect of amnesties, according to a statement published on the Russian State Duma's website on Tuesday.

"The validity of the document does not extend to those who have previously been convicted of terrorist and extremist acts, as well as offences against the sexual sanctity of minors," the statement said.

The Russian parliament also wants to exempt Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine from prosecution for minor and medium-level crimes, including theft and fraud.

During their military service, mobilized soldiers and volunteers should not be bothered by the authorities, it said.

Furthermore, it is possible to exempt oneself from investigations and criminal records by receiving medals during military service or by leaving service after being injured or reaching the age limit, the law states.

Last summer, it became known that the Wagner mercenary group recruited criminals from prisons. Serious criminals are also said to have been released in the process.

However, human rights activists have criticized Russia for continuing to recruit prisoners en masse for military service.

At the weekend, Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin said that 32,000 of the criminals recruited from prisons had returned home after serving in the war in Ukraine.

Prigozhin has also complained that his access to Russian prisons for recruitment has been blocked.

Ukraine meanwhile continues a counteroffensive to retake territory seized by Russia. Ukrainian fighters were actively fighting the Russian occupiers, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening report.

"Now our fighters are very actively destroying the enemy in the south and in the east and physically cleansing Ukraine," he said. "This will continue in the future."

However, Ukrainian Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar said in the evening that Russian troops were resisting fiercely in places and mining areas.

In the south, the offensive was going according to plan, she said.

Ukraine's fighters are not taking any big steps, but they are moving forward with conviction, she said, though she sought to dampen expectations, saying this was not going to be a quick offensive with successes like in a "movie."

Ukraine recently liberated several villages. Maliar also said that the Ukrainian forces were partly on the defensive and the Russians were on the offensive.

Nevertheless, she said, Ukrainian forces were fulfilling all tasks, liberating the country metre by metre. And she stressed, as she had done several times recently, that the main blow of the offensive was still to come.

Earlier, Russia launched a wave of drone attacks on Ukraine, most of them aimed at Kiev.

The General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces said air defences destroyed 28 of the 30 Iranian-made Shahed drones launched by Russia.

The western Ukrainian city of Lviv, which has so far been largely unscathed by the nearly 16-month war, was also the target of rare airstrikes on Tuesday.

The head of the military administration for Lviv, Maksym Kozytskyi, said that a critical infrastructure site had been hit but that no people were injured.

In the flooded Kherson region, one volunteer was killed and eight more were injured as Russian soldiers fired on the area, a Ukrainian official said.

The men were clearing mud from an area where the floodwaters had receded when they were attacked, the head of Ukraine's presidential office, Andriy Yermak said on Telegram.

The incident comes two weeks after devastating floods unleashed by the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in an area of Kherson occupied by Russian troops.

Kiev accuses Moscow of having deliberately blown up the structure, a view taken by many international specialists. However, Moscow denies this.

Zelensky is hoping that a reconstruction conference that begins in London on Wednesday will provide substantial help to his country.

"A rebuilt Ukraine, a transformed Ukraine, a stronger Ukraine is ... a security guarantor, a protection against any form of Russian terror," he said in his evening address.

At the meeting, which will last until Thursday, states and major corporations plan to announce aid for Ukraine's reconstruction.

"The first meetings have already started in London," he said, adding that talks have been held in Germany, Switzerland, France and Italy on aid for reconstruction.

The talks are not only about construction projects, but also about protection for Ukraine, he added.

Zelensky is preparing to present his philosophy of a Ukrainian transformation on Wednesday, and the "complete vision" is to be presented in the country itself at the end of the month.

Meanwhile across the border in Russia, at least four people were killed and several were injured in an explosion at a gunpowder factory.

"There were 12 victims, four of them died," the company based in the city of Kotovsk some 430 kilometres south-east of Moscow said, according to the Interfax news agency.

The victims were workers, and two were critically injured. The accident occurred as a result of assembly work on a hot water tank, the company said.

In Russia, which has been waging a full-scale war on Ukraine for about 16 months, fires and explosions in military and infrastructure facilities have become increasingly common.

Many have been due to attacks, and some of these have been claimed by Russian groups.

Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

A few weeks ago, Kiev launched a counteroffensive to liberate areas mainly in the south-east of Ukraine.