In at Least a Fifth of Russia’s Federal Subjects, Forcible Mobilization for War in Ukraine Already Taking Place De Facto, Rights Activists Report

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 24 – While Kremlin spokesman continue to claim that suggestions Moscow will launch a mobilization campaign after the Duma elections are Ukrainian propaganda and that Russia doesn’t need any mobilization to man its arm, in at least a fifth of Russia’s federal subjects, a forcible mobilization is already taking place.

            For Kremlin claims that reports about mobilization are Ukrainian propaganda and that Russia doesn’t need any mobilization, see meduza.io/news/2026/08/25/kreml-nazval-informatsionnymi-utkami-soobscheniya-o-novoy-mobilizatsii-v-rossii and ura.news/articles/1053121221.

            For reports by rights activists that officials are using violence and threats to force men to sign up for the military and serve in Ukraine in 17 federal subjects, approximately one-fifth of all of these, actions that look very much like what a mobilization would, see the detailed article at verstka.media/pravozashhitniki-soobshhili-o-nasilstvennyh-zaderzhaniyah-i-prinuzhdenii-k-kontraktu-kak-minimum-v-17-regionah-rossii.

            What these reports almost certainly mean is that Putin plans to run a covert mobilization campaign, handing off the task to regional officials and paid recruiters and then denying that a mobilization effort is taking place and disclaiming any responsibility for what is happening, a pattern he has adopted with regard to other policies already.

            And that in turn means that Putin likely won’t declare a mobilization even after the election largely because he won’t have to: his appointees in the oblasts, krays, and republics of the Russian Federation are already carrying one out in all but name. 

 

Outcome of Kazakhstan Election Shows Where Russia and Other Post-Soviet States are Likely Heading, Grashchenkov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 24 – The outcome of the elections to the new single chamber Kazakhstan parliament shows the direction that party building is likely to take in the Russian Federation and other post-Soviet states, according to Ilya Grashchenkov, the director of the Center for the Development of Regional Policy.

            The victory of the pro-government Adilet Party with 71.7 percent of the vote “may look like the emergence of a new super party” but in fact, the way the new party was formed and how it structured the opposition shows something more profound, the commentator says (politrus.com/20260824/ilya-graschenkov-17/).

            The former party of power in Kazakhstan which Nazarbayev assembled did not go into the opposition but instead joined Adilet largely because “the old party brand was too closely connected” with the past, Grashchenkov says. And that is “an important example for United Russia” which may be compelled to do the same thing for the same reason.

            At the same time, he continues, the opposition was divided in a quite meaningful way and the most dangerous form of opposition leadership was excluded so that “there is no one party there that provides a focus for protest for everyone.” Instead, there are two relatively clear directions.”

            On the one hand, there are two parties, Respublika and Ak Zhol which are right wing and entrepreneurial; and on the other there are three, the Ayul Agrarian, the Social Democrats and the Peoples Party who represent demands for social justice and are left of center paternalists. These two wings of the Kazakhstan political spectrum received roughly equal shares in the election.

            But what is “especially significant” not only for Kazakhstan but for Russia and other former Soviet republics, Grashchenkov says, is that there is no analogue to the LDPR of the late Vladimir Zhirinovsky. That is, there is “no party trying to be at one and the same time nationalist, social, protest and fully systemic.”

            According to the commentator, “the LDPR model worked as long as there was a politician capable” of appearing set to oppose the regime within limits. “The Kazakh arrangement now shows a more modern design” with entrepreneurs voting for business parties and left-wing voters for socialist ones.

            Grashchenkov concludes: “Kazakhstan thus offers the voters a design” and those in power with a model “here the new party of power as a result of transit and several small parties representing limited but understandable interests.” Russia and the others may choose to follow such an arrangement. “That’s something to think about.”

Moscow Rapidly Expanding Use of AI Technology to Increase Repression of Non-Russians, Saami Activist Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 23 – At various international conferences, Russian representatives frequently claim that Moscow is using artificial intelligence to protect non-Russians living in the Russian Federation; but that is an outright lie that must be countered, Andrey Danilov says.

            The Saami activist says that in fact Moscow’s use of AI is making it ever easier for Russian officials to search out those whom Moscow has already defined as extremist and then take steps against them, an increasing share of whom are non-Russians (indigenous-russia.com/archives/49776).

            It has just become known, Danilov continues, that researchers at the Southern Urals State University have come up with an AI system that “automatically analyzes texts and searchers for terms like ‘foreign agents,’ ‘extremists,’ ‘undesirable organizations’ and other categories” and comparing these texts with Russian government data bases.

            Consequently, he concludes, what everyone needs to remember and be reminded of is that “artificial intelligence itself does not protect human rights. Instead, it strengthens the system that is making use of it.” When it is in the hands of those who want to expand human rights, AI can have one result; when it is in the hands of those against that, it has a very different one.

More than Their Elders, Younger Russians View Corruption as ‘Normal’ and Even Acceptable and are Less Willing to Cooperate in Struggle against It, Moscow Sociologist Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 24 – Russians aged 18 to 23, that is those born in the Putin years, are more inclined to view corruption as something entirely “normal” and to accept many forms of it as acceptable than are members of older age groups, according to Yana Ardelyanova of the Moscow Institute of Sociology.

            The Russian scholar says that this is the case if one looks beyond the near universal willingness of people to say that corruption is wrong in principle and recognizes that this is part of a growing lack of trust in the government and social institutions (ng.ru/economics/2026-08-24/1_4_9566_corruption.html).

            Even worse than their willingness to view corruption as somehow part of life now, Ardelyanova says, young people are more willing to take part in corrupt schemes than are their elders because they view many forms of corruption like paying off professors or doctors for preferred treatment as quite normal.

            She says that this represents “a clear decline” among young Russians “regarding the values of service to the state and society” and even “a crisis of trust in state and public institutions, the result among other things of the digital environment in which informal leaers such as bloggers are displacing that of officials.”

            According to the report about the sociologist’s findings published in Nezavisimaya Gazeta, other polls and scholarly investigations provide additional support for her conclusions, making this finding far more likely to be true and thus far more worrying than many might be inclined to think. 

To Keep Armenia in Russia’s Orbit, Moscow May Soon Use Migration Weapon, Shustov Suggests

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 24 – Roughly a quarter of Armenia’s GDP consists of transfer payments by Armenians working in the Russian Federation; and if Yerevan pursues EU membership, Moscow will be “compelled” to consider imposing restrictions on Armenian migrant workers in Russia, Aleksandr Shustov says.

            So far this possibility and the deadline Moscow has supposedly set for Yerevan to make a choice about its future have been mentioned only in the Armenian media, the Russian nationalist commentator says (ritmeurasia.ru/news--2026-08-24--naskolko-silna-migracionnaja-zavisimost-armenii-ot-rossii-89830).

            But since Armenia gives no sign of changing its direction, Shustov continues, Moscow will have to “use new instruments” to influence Yerevan, and “one of these soon could be limitations on labor migration” from that country, something that the figures show would be devastating for Armenia.

            According to the Armenian Central Bank, Armenians working in the Russian Federation sent home 3.87 billion US dollars in 2025, an amount equal to 13.3 percent of Armenia’s GDP. That is less than the share of transfer payments to Tajikistan or Kyrgyzstan but still enormous and potentially crippling.

            That the Kremlin is thinking about doing precisely this, Shustov continues, was suggested by Putin’s remark earlier this year that if Armenia breaks with Russia economically, it will suffer an economic loss of 14 percent of GDP, less than a single percentage point different from what ending such transfer payments would be.

            The number of Armenian workers in the Russian Federation has been falling in recent months, but until then, with the singular exception of the covid year, it has been running at about 160,000 a year over most of the last decade. If these people are forced to go home, Yerevan will find it difficult to support them; and they will find it very difficult to find work in other countries.

            This is what Armenia should be thinking about rather than pursuing what Shustov clearly considers the will of the wisp of EU membership; and his words suggest very strongly that Moscow is quite prepared to take this step, something that Armenia’s friends and supporters should take into consideration as well. 

Russian Literature Now Threatened by Both Censorship and AI, Two Phenomena which Re-Enforce One Another, Literary Critic Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 23 – In 1946, George Orwell wrote in his essay “The Suppression of Literature” that in a totalitarian society of the future, government censorship will be re-enforced by a system in which “machines will write books,” something that is now happening and means that Russian literature is threatened by both censorship and AI, Semyon Vladimirov says.

            Government censorship in the Russian Federation has attracted enormous attention, the Russian literary critic says; but the ways in which AI re-enforces it both in the course of editorial checking when computer algorithms are used and in the writing of books that will slip through the system has not (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2026/08/23/neiroslop-i-neirotsenzor).

            At least since last year, major Russian publishing houses are using AI to check manuscripts not as elsewhere to ensure that a human wrote them but rather than they will pass muster with the censors, thus helping the latter to restrict the publication of works the officials don’t approve of, Vladimirov says.

            That is insidious enough given how many mistakes such AI surveys involve, confusing something innocent with something that must be banned. But AI is also allowing writers who hope for publication to avoid any mention of something that could get them in trouble, thus helping censorship and leaving literature ever grayer.

            The specific features of the Russian case that Vladimirov points to are important, but his general point is even more so. AI can easily re-enforce impulses to censor especially if it makes it easy for other governments to impose their will via what may appear to many as “objective” computer models.

Moscow will Promote Traditional Values but Only ‘Delicately and Subtly,’ Kremlin Aide Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Aug. 23 – Putin frequently says that Russians “sincerely value” traditional values and that he will continue to support them in that ( nazaccent.ru/content/45631-vladimir-putin-my-iskrenne-dorozhim-nashim-kulturnym-i-duhovnym-dostoyaniem/). But there are signs that this effort may now be slowing because of popular resistance.

            In an interview with TASS, Garri Minkh, Putin’s representative to the Duma, says that promoting traditional values among children and adults remains importance but that it must “be done with sufficient delicacy and subtlety” (tass.ru/politika/28030937 and nazaccent.ru/content/45856-prodvigat-tradicionnye-cennosti-v-rossii-budut-delikatno-i-tonko/).

            His words and the fact that this message was delivered by an official responsible for ensuring that Duma deputies follow Putin’s lead suggest that some Russians may be upset by the heavy-handed way some Duma initiatives in this area have been structured and that the Kremlin wants to ensure that deputies don’t overstep the mark and provoke a negative reaction.

            Minkh said that pursuing the goal in this way is “a very challenging task, as there is a risk of slipping into mere rote adherence to dogma” or not forming a unified basis of identity which “serves the good of our society and state,” an apparent warning that the Kremlin wants deputies to avoid pushing in this direction too hard and too quickly.