Military officials in Russia are continuing to deny many young men the opportunity to perform alternative civilian service (ACS), rather than military service, despite their demonstrating to the military authorities that they hold beliefs which preclude participation in military service.

Conscription Commissions in Udmurtiya refused alternative civilian service to at least three young men from the same Pentecostal church, despite their long-held religious beliefs precluding military service and despite the fact that fellow church members had applied successfully for ACS in earlier years. Courts rejected their administrative lawsuits challenging the refusals. Two of the men are known to have been sent to military units, while the third obtained a medical exemption (see forthcoming F18News article).

"No matter how we litigated, no matter what we did, we were told: 'There is no alternative service now, there is martial law in the country'," one of the three Pentecostals told Forum 18. "Although alternative service has not been abolished at the state level and there is no martial law in place. No matter what information and evidence our lawyers presented, the court didn't even listen" (see forthcoming F18News article).

For a Jehovah's Witness in Primorye in the Russian Far East, it took a year and a half – "or three conscription cycles" – for a judge finally to order his local Conscription Commission to consider his application for ACS again on its merits. On this occasion, in October 2025, the Commission approved his request (see forthcoming F18News article).

Available data on Jehovah's Witnesses for 2025 show that "refusals to grant alternative civilian service were significantly more frequent than positive decisions", Jehovah's Witnesses told Forum 18. (Their communities have been banned since 2017 as "extremist") (see below).

Unlike the individual in Primorye, most young Jehovah's Witness men do not openly declare their religious affiliation when applying for ACS, Jehovah's Witnesses told Forum 18. They added that, as of the end of 2025, there were reports of four criminal cases initiated against believers for evading military service. "At least one case has already resulted in a guilty sentence. There are also guilty sentences in cases initiated in 2024." Punishments included 360 hours' community service and fines of up to six weeks' average wages (see forthcoming F18News article).

As Russia's war in Ukraine continues, more young men than ever are undertaking ACS. By the end of 2025, the figure was almost three times higher than it was when Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 (see below).

Set against a significant increase in the overall number of conscripts – a result of raising the upper age limit and making it harder to evade the draft – alternative servicemen nevertheless remain a small proportion of conscripts, and it is becoming ever more difficult to apply successfully for ACS, according to human rights observers (see below).

Conscripts who want to do alternative civilian service can be caught up in a cycle of repeated applications, refusals, and lawsuits which can last years, and may result in their being sent to military units anyway (see below).

If a Conscription Commission turns down a request for ACS and the man does not appear when called up for military service, he is vulnerable to prosecution under Criminal Code Article 328 ("Evasion of conscription into military service in the absence of legal grounds for exemption from this service"). This can incur large fines or – very rarely - up to 2 years' imprisonment.

"There has been a nationwide rise in arbitrary denials of alternative service," Call to Conscience, a group which helps conscientious objectors, noted in its annual report for 2025. "Conscription Commissions rarely provide justifications for their decisions. This practice is unlawful and undermines the constitutional intent behind the rights to freedom of conscience and alternative service; in the context of the war, it serves as a form of pressure against those who openly oppose militarism" (see below).

Most refusals appear to be based on the applicant's supposed failure to "substantiate" his beliefs and demonstrate that they are long-held and "incompatible with military service". While sometimes this is because "the conscript failed to prepare and could not clearly explain his motives, or did not submit the necessary documents", according to Info AGS, a resource portal for conscripts, "Conscription Commissions most often act with bias and a lack of objectivity, ignoring even your most compelling arguments".

Forum 18 wrote to the Military Commissariats of several regions in which conscientious objectors have frequently been unsuccessful in applying for alternative service, asking:
– why Conscription Commissions have refused applications from individuals with clearly articulated and well-evidenced beliefs which prevented them from doing military service;
– why Conscription Commissions have refused applications on the basis of missed deadlines, when the Constitutional Court has ruled this was not a sufficient reason for denying ACS;
– and what has happened to those individuals who were not allowed to do ACS.
Forum 18 has received no responses (see forthcoming F18News article).

Seeking alternative civilian service

Many young men who apply for ACS are Council of Churches Baptists, whose church has a strong pacifist tradition. While it does not formally oppose the undertaking of military service, when Baptist conscripts apply for ACS, their church communities tend to support them in collating documents for the Conscription Commission and going to court if refused.

Other ACS applicants are known to come from other Protestant traditions and occasionally from Orthodox backgrounds, or describe themselves simply as Christian. Others are pacifists without a religious motivation.

Jehovah's Witnesses are conscientious objectors to military service and do not undertake any kind of activity supporting any country's military. But they are willing to undertake an alternative civilian service.

Russia's Supreme Court liquidated their organisations and banned their activities as "extremist" in 2017. Until then, Jehovah's Witnesses constituted approximately 60 per cent of applicants for alternative civilian service and were usually successful.

Now, however, young Jehovah's Witness men risk prosecution for "continuing the activities of an extremist organisation" if they cite active involvement in their religious communities as evidence of their beliefs. Nevertheless, they "continue to seek alternative civilian service", Jehovah's Witnesses have told Forum 18, and while "most do not make public their religious affiliation, there are those who have openly (and without significant consequences) declared themselves" to be Jehovah's Witnesses.

International standards

The United Nations (UN) Human Rights Committee has stated in its General Comment 22 that conscientious objection to military service comes under International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) Article 18 ("Freedom of thought, conscience and religion"). General Comment 22 notes that if a religion or belief is official or followed by a majority of the population this "shall not result in any impairment of the enjoyment of any of the rights under the Covenant .. nor in any discrimination against adherents to other religions or non-believers."

In relation to conscientious objection to military service, General Comment 22 also states among other things: "there shall be no differentiation among conscientious objectors on the basis of the nature of their particular beliefs; likewise, there shall be no discrimination against conscientious objectors because they have failed to perform military service."

This has been reinforced by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) recognising "the right of everyone to have conscientious objection to military service as a legitimate exercise of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion". The OHCHR has also noted in its Conscientious Objection to Military Service guide that ICCPR Article 18 is "a non-derogable right .. even during times of a public emergency threatening the life of the nation".

In 2022 the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention stated (WGAD-HRC50) that "the right to conscientious objection to military service is part of the absolutely protected right to hold a belief under article 18 (1) of the Covenant, which cannot be restricted by States". The Working Group also stated: "States should refrain from imprisoning individuals solely on the basis of their conscientious objection to military service, and should release those that have been so imprisoned."

Various judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Strasbourg – to whose jurisdiction Russia was subject until 16 September 2022 - have also defined states' obligations to respect and implement the right to conscientious objection to military service, as part of the right to freedom of religion or belief.

Numbers undertaking alternative service increase

At the end of 2025, 3,121 men were doing alternative civilian service in Russia, according to Rostrud (Labour Ministry) statistics. This represents a 32 per cent increase since the end of 2024, and a 182 per cent increase on the end of 2022, the year that Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. They still represent only about 1 per cent of all conscripts, although this is difficult to calculate given the different timeframes for ACS and military service (21 months vs. 12 months).

The increase in alternative servicemen may be partly explained by the rise in the overall number of conscripts, and partly because of the narrowing of other options for those who wish to avoid serving in the army. The upper age limit for conscription was raised from 27 to 30 in January 2024, punishments for failing to respond to summons have been made harsher, and planned draft numbers have risen, with the 2025 spring draft being the largest in 14 years.

The use of electronic draft summonses began in 2025. These are issued directly to potential conscripts' online state services (Gosuslugi) accounts and considered automatically served after seven days. If potential conscripts do not respond within 20 days, they may become subject to restrictions such as blocked driving licences and bans on leaving the country, though these are so far haphazardly enforced.

"There has been a nationwide rise in arbitrary denials of alternative service"

Based on their own monitoring, conscripts' rights groups have noted that Conscription Commissions have become increasingly likely to refuse applications for ACS.
"There has been a nationwide rise in arbitrary denials of alternative service", Call to Conscience noted in its annual report for 2025, published in February 2026.

"It is often difficult to predict what 'evidence' a Commission will deem relevant or sufficient," Call to Conscience wrote, "and Commissions rarely provide justifications for their decisions. This practice is unlawful and undermines the constitutional intent behind the rights to freedom of conscience and alternative service – in the context of the war, it serves as a form of pressure against those who openly oppose militarism."

Call to Conscience added: "Conscientious objectors who have re-applied for alternative civilian service have sometimes faced refusals to have their applications considered, attempts to conscript them, and – less frequently – criminal charges for failing to appear in response to unlawful summonses. While investigators have sometimes sided with the draftees, courts have occasionally found them guilty of draft evasion, even though they were merely exercising their constitutional right."

Getting approval for ACS in Moscow in particular now seems nearly impossible, Call to Conscience observed, with "literally only a few individuals who succeeded" in 2025.

"While the number of applications for alternative service has risen, authorities are increasingly placing obstacles in the way, resulting in fewer applications being approved," Sergey Krivenko, director of human rights groups "Citizen and Army" and "Citizen.Army.Law", told Radio Liberty on 1 October 2025. Police use of CCTV and phone records is making it "increasingly difficult" to avoid conscription, he noted, and ACS is effectively "the only remaining legal avenue that has not been altered".

(The Justice Ministry added Krivenko to its register of "foreign agents" in August 2023. Citizen.Army.Law was added to the foreign agent register in December 2021 and removed in December 2024, a month after it was liquidated as a legal entity.)

Available data on Jehovah's Witnesses for 2025 also show that "refusals to grant alternative civilian service were significantly more frequent than positive decisions", Jehovah's Witnesses told Forum 18 on 10 July 2026.

Constitutional right to alternative civilian service for conscripts

All Russian men must carry out military service for 12 months between the ages of 18 and 30. After this, they are enrolled in the reserves (and thereby become subject to mobilisation). It is possible to gain exemption on medical grounds, or deferrals for medical or educational reasons and in certain family situations, although these opportunities are narrowing.

Conscripts also have the right, enshrined in the Constitution, "to replace [military service] with Alternative Civilian Service [ACS]", and instead work in a state or municipal institution (for 21 months), or in a civilian role in the armed forces (for 18 months).

As yet, the explicit right to Alternative Civilian Service exists only for conscripts, with no equivalent provided for in law for mobilised men. Some have been able to avoid mobilisation to fight in Ukraine by applying for ACS anyway.

Applicants for ACS who are not from Russia's indigenous peoples must demonstrate that military service is contrary to their beliefs, whether these are religious or not. Under the 2002 Law on Alternative Civilian Service, "Citizens who have expressed a desire to replace conscripted military service with Alternative Civilian Service must substantiate [their claim] that military service is contrary to their beliefs or religion", and set out "the reasons and circumstances [prichiny i obstoyatelstva] that prompted [them] to apply for this". Conscripts do not need to demonstrate links with any particular religious or pacifist association.

"The concept of 'convictions incompatible with military service' encompasses a broad range of deeply held values and principles that prevent a citizen from fulfilling military-related obligations," the Movement of Conscientious Objectors notes in its guide to alternative service. "Precision in articulating these convictions within the application is a key factor in successfully navigating the process of substituting military service with alternative civilian service."

(The Justice Ministry added the Movement of Conscientious Objectors to its register of "foreign agents" in June 2023.)

Conscription Commissions' powers to refuse ACS applications

If a Conscription Commission does not accept that a conscript genuinely holds such beliefs, then it can refuse his application for alternative civilian service.

The Conscription Commission may refuse an application if: a) the deadline is missed or the procedure incorrectly followed; b) the submitted documents and other information "are not in accordance with the citizen's arguments that military service is contrary to his beliefs or religion"; c) the submitted information is false; d) the individual has twice failed to appear at meetings of the Conscription Commission; e) an individual has previously been granted ACS and has failed to do it.

Russia's Constitutional Court ruled on 17 October 2006 that a missed deadline should not be grounds for outright refusal to consider a request for ACS on its merits. This remains, however, a common reason for denying ACS, alongside the conclusion that an individual's submitted information does not back up his professed beliefs.

Conscription Commissions often dismiss an applicant's beliefs as merely "a negative attitude towards military service", or cast doubt on their validity by suggesting that he has not held them for very long. The claim that "personal convictions and a negative attitude towards [military] service are distinct concepts does not hold up to scrutiny", the Movement of Conscientious Objectors insists in its guide to alternative service. "An individual whose values directly conflict with the military and its functions cannot view military service positively."

"The assertion that convictions must be formed at an early age or held over a long period lacks both scientific and legal basis," the Movement argues. "A conviction is a consistent opinion that can emerge from experience or realisation, regardless of age. Even if a person is twenty years old and his views on military service were formed only a few months ago, this does not diminish their significance."

If an applicant is unsuccessful, he can either appeal to a higher-level Conscription Commission or file an administrative lawsuit at a district-level court, requesting that the Conscription Commission's decision be ruled unlawful.

Going to court means that the implementation of the Conscription Commission's decision is suspended until the court's decision enters into legal force. If a lawsuit is initially unsuccessful, the plaintiff has one month to appeal, and the decision does not enter legal force before the appeal ruling.

Before 2026, it was therefore likely that the call-up period would end before the lawsuit was resolved, meaning that the individual was not liable to be conscripted immediately even if his legal challenge failed, and he could make a new application for alternative service in the next call-up period.

From 1 January 2026, however, conscription has become a year-round process. This means that Conscription Commission meetings, medical examinations, and other procedures can take place all year, rather than only in the previous traditional call-up periods of 1 April–15 July and 1 October–31 December. Deployment to military units and alternative service positions still take place within these dates.

Conscientious objectors must still apply for ACS six months before they are due to be called up, but Conscription Commissions' decisions now remain valid for one year, rather than just the current draft period. This gives military officials much more time to summon failed ACS applicants for medical examinations and attempt to conscript them.

Undue pressure from military officials

Russian and international human rights bodies – including the Movement of Conscientious Objectors and the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection – argue that procedures for assessing alternative civilian service applications are often not carried out fairly or independently. Military officials put undue pressure on ACS applicants, and decisions are largely taken by military commissars, despite Conscription Commissions being ostensibly independent bodies chaired by local civilian officials.

The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Russian Federation, Mariana Katzarova, stated in her 28 October 2024 report (A/79/508) that "torture and ill treatment have been used by Russian army commanders against conscientious objectors, mobilized men and regular servicemen who refuse to obey orders to fight against Ukraine".

Pressure to sign army contracts

By law, conscripts can only be sent to fight after four months' service and training in a military specialism, and the Russian government has promised not to send conscripts to fight in Ukraine. Conscripts often come under pressure to sign army contracts, however, which since the start of Russia's war in Ukraine are of indeterminate length.

"In 2024, we recorded instances of conscripts being coerced into signing military contracts, though such reports were relatively infrequent," Artyom Klyga, head of the legal department of the Movement of Conscientious Objectors, told Radio Liberty on 12 March 2026.

"By 2025, the situation had deteriorated," Klyga added. "The number of inquiries rose, and far more individuals were being pressured to sign contracts. There have even been reports of young men being urged to sign contracts while en route to their military units, sometimes even on the trains themselves. This coercion involves tactics that amount to torture, such as sleep deprivation, forced running in chemical protection suits, and the like."

In some cities, police and military officials carry out mass "round-ups" [oblavy], during which young men of conscription age are detained, taken to assembly points, and fast-tracked through medical examinations and conscription.

Call to Conscience advises individuals with pending applications for ACS to challenge the unlawful conscription in court, and those who have not yet applied should "file a report on serving without arms and push for it to be considered". Once in their military units, conscientious objectors should "refuse to undergo training, take the military oath, wear army uniform – anything which contravenes their beliefs".

One-year "contracts" offered to students seeking ACS

In June 2026, the Movement of Conscientious Objectors reported that military officials were going to Russian colleges and universities and offering students who had applied for alternative civilian service a "special contract for ACS applicants" with the Defence Ministry or the National Guard (Rosgvardiya), with 12 months' service, deployment away from the front, and financial benefits.

"Labelling it 'alternative' is convenient – the hope is that you will confuse it with the official Alternative Civilian Service," the Movement observed.

The Movement of Conscientious Objectors stressed that real alternative service is civilian work organised by the Labour Ministry (Rostrud), and contracts should be signed only with the employing organisations themselves – such as hospitals, care homes, or cultural institutions. Any military contract, under the 2022 decree on partial mobilisation, is effectively open-ended and cannot be terminated unilaterally.

"Often, this amounts to a one-way ticket to the front line or Russia's border regions," the Movement warned. While the job description in a "special contract" may appear to be "innocuous (driver, medic, mechanic), that does not guarantee you won't be sent to a combat zone, promises that 'you will not handle a weapon' or 'will stay at the base' are not legally binding, and the decision on where you are deployed is made by the command – not by you".

Students can defer military service for the duration of their courses, but become subject to conscription as soon as that deferment ends. (END)

More reports on freedom of thought, conscience and belief in Russia

For background information see Forum 18's Russia religious freedom survey

Forum 18's compilation of Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) freedom of religion or belief commitments

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