A draft law on a phased increase in the military age in Russia has been submitted to the State Duma.
The legislative initiative was developed by the chairman of the Defense Committee Andrei Kartapolov and his deputies.
“In order to guarantee that citizens receive both secondary general education and secondary vocational or higher education, it is proposed to gradually raise the lower limit of the draft age to 21 years (currently from 18 years old),” the explanatory note says.
It is also proposed to raise the upper limit of the draft age to 30 years (currently up to 27 years).
“At the same time, the draft law provides for citizens aged 27 to 30 who are in the reserve and who have not completed military service by conscription, without legal grounds, to do military service by conscription, if they have such a desire,” it is specified. in the document.
In addition, according to the authors of the bill, its adoption will allow “to exclude the appearance of schoolchildren and students in military commissariats to participate in activities related to the granting of a deferment from conscription”, as well as save about 640 million rubles “for organizing and conducting a medical examination of conscripts receiving general or secondary vocational education”.
As the press service of the State Duma notes, the document provides for a gradual increase in the lower limit of the military age.
If the bill is approved, the draft age in 2024 will be from 19 to 30 years, in 2025 - from 20 to 30 years, from January 1, 2026 - from 21 to 30 years.
At the moment, the draft age in Russia is set from 18 to 27 years.
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In December 2022, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, at an expanded meeting of the collegium of the Ministry of Defense, proposed to gradually increase the draft age from 18 to 21 years, and the age limit from 27 to 30 years.
He also stated the need to increase the number of military personnel in the RF Armed Forces to 1.5 million people "to ensure the solution of tasks to ensure the military security" of Russia.
Vladimir Putin, in turn, agreed with the voiced proposals.
Later, the press secretary of the head of state, Dmitry Peskov, confirmed that the Russian president conceptually supported this idea, but its details and design should be implemented by the Russian Ministry of Defense.
The bill on the "qualitative development of the army"
One of the authors of the bill, Andrey Kartapolov, chairman of the State Duma Defense Committee, stressed that the initiative is aimed at "the qualitative development of the army", and not at the quantitative one.
“When the amendments finally come into force, more developed, psychologically and physically more mature people with certain life experience, skills and competencies will join the ranks of the military.
Therefore, we are talking about improving the quality of recruitment and through this - increasing the combat capabilities of the armed forces, ”he said in an interview with Parliamentary Newspaper.
The MP also spoke negatively about the proposals to increase the term of service in the army.
“There is no need to increase the term of service in the army today.
This issue is not considered in our committee in principle, and we have not heard any such proposals from any of our colleagues.
Moreover, if such a bill still goes to the State Duma for consideration from somewhere outside, our position will be strictly negative, ”stated Kartapolov.
In turn, Andrei Krasov, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Defense Committee, expressed confidence in a conversation with RT that the bill would lead to strengthening the state's defense capability.
“We assume that the federal law will come into force on January 1, 2024.
The result of the initiative is that the conscript becomes more mature, more experienced and, without a doubt, this fact will affect the successful fulfillment of the tasks assigned to him, ”he said.