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Mobilized Soldiers Launch a Strike Refusing to Die Without Pay
Russian national guard and riot police called in to put down their protest
Many of the “mobiki,” what the newly mobilized civilians are called in Russian, were pulled from jobs that paid them wages. Many of them were unemployed and the promise of earning over 3000 dollars in a month was simply too good to be true.
They were right. Russia is struggling to pay the mobiki and now the first major strike is underway outside the central Russian city of Ulyanovsk — the hometown of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin.
More than 100 soldiers at a training center in Russia have gone on strike for not getting paid their promised salary, according to multiple reports.
The draftees, who are stationed in the southern region of Ulyanovsk, said they refuse to fight in Ukraine until they receive a promised sum of 195,000 rubles ($3,170), the independent Russian news outlet The Insider reported on Wednesday (100 Drafted Soldiers Went on Strike).
Since Vladimir Putin announced the mobilization of 300,000 civilians on September 21st, Russia has experienced widespread protests.
An estimated 300,000 men left the country to avoid the draft. There have been dozens of videos uploaded to social media…