Genocide of russia’s national minorities in its war with Ukraine

Abstract

Abstract. As russia faces increasing losses of its armed forces in the war with Ukraine, the kremlin is trying to make up for them in every possible way, even though the russian dictator is afraid to introduce highly unpopular full-scale conscription openly. Instead, under these circumstances, the country is conducting covert ‘partial mobilisation’, particularly engaging the male population from remote distressed regions with the compact residence of national minorities and the occupied areas of Georgia and Ukraine, Syrian mercenaries, and tens of thousands of convicts. Conscription is far less common in russia’s major cities, which are both economically and socially developed and primarily inhabited by ethnic russians. Conversely, it is aimed at wiping out the national minorities coming from remote, disadvantaged regions. Thus, the war covertly serves to carry out ethnic segregation and genocide (effectively, extermination) of russia’s ethnic minorities. Although public information is rather meagre and restricted by the russian authorities during the war, it reveals that the number of casualties among the poorest national minorities from russia’s remote regions disproportionately exceeds the corresponding toll of ethnic russians who have met the same fate. Keywords: genocide, national minority, russia–Ukraine war, international humanitarian law, conscription, military mobilisation, private military company.