Reports emerge of mass round-ups of men in Russia's Penza Oblast for deployment to war in Ukraine

Police officers and military enlistment officials in Penza and Penza Oblast, Russia, are carrying out mass round-ups of men.

Source: Radio Liberty, based on reports in Russian media, human rights projects and social media

Details: The raids are taking place in Penza, Kamenka and Kuznetsk. According to reports, men are being pressured into signing contracts with Russia's Ministry of Defence for deployment to the war against Ukraine.

"In Penza, they're taking everyone indiscriminately, stopping cars and public transport, rounding up men and taking them away to sign contracts. Raids are happening across the entire city," a local resident told the human rights group Idite Lesom.

The Movement of Conscientious Objectors has also received several reports that young men in Penza and the surrounding region are being "caught and forced to sign contracts" with the Russian Armed Forces.

Another resident of Penza told the Mobilizatsiya channel that authorities had started "catching men" as early as January, but that the raids have intensified recently.

Comments from local residents under posts by Novaya Alternativa also indicate that people in the region are being forcibly recruited for the war. The outlet previously reported that in November 2025, security forces took Sursk resident Vladimir Podkovyrkin from his home to force him to sign a contract with Russia's Ministry of Defence, and that in May 2026 Stanislav Vyaltsyn was tortured inside a military enlistment office on Skladskaya Street.

ASTRA reported that local resident Anastasia Fomina had earlier published an open letter to the head of Russia's Investigative Committee regarding the abduction and deployment of her 58-year-old father, who was taken from his home in the village of Russkiy Kachim and sent to the front. According to Fomina, her father and other men who were at the enlistment office that day were pressured into signing contracts. They were sent to Russia's Rostov Oblast the following day.

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