Last December, winter icy rain in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region caused its usual havoc, with falling branches cutting power lines and causing electricity, water and heating outages.
Except there weren’t enough people to make the necessary repairs. Forced mobilization operations in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory have significantly reduced the workforce and hollowed out municipal services.
The shortage of essential workers is expected to worsen as the Kremlin continues to recruit local Ukrainians. The situation has deteriorated so much that Ukrainian military intelligence says that resistance against Russia in the occupied territories has increased recently.
Local residents in the occupied territories regularly chat on the Telegram messenger app, lamenting lack of water and electricity, burst heating and sewage pipes flooding the basements of high-rise buildings, and growing piles of garbage.
In another example of the lack of service, a video posted on a local Telegram channel shows people walking along a road near the Russian-occupied city of Donetsk as cars weave through giant potholes. is shown. At least 10 bus routes in Donetsk have been suspended in recent months, according to both local residents and Russian occupation authorities.
“The problems we are seeing in the occupied territories are related to the crisis in local government and urban engineering services,” Kostyantyn Batotsky, head of the Azov Development Agency and a native of Donetsk, told the Kyiv Independent newspaper. Ta.
“These are due to the fact that we don’t have people, we don’t have repair teams, we don’t have locksmiths, we don’t have basic skilled workers, because they’re all conscripted,” he says.
According to Ukraine’s military intelligence service, Russia has forcibly conscripted an estimated 65,000 Ukrainian men in the occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions since the invasion began in earnest in 2022. Forced conscription during occupation constitutes a war crime under international law.
Many of them are expected to have been killed in action, as Russia is reportedly using these people as cannon fodder. Their absence is felt throughout the workers of the occupied territories.
“In some companies, up to 80% of men are conscripted,” Pavlo Lisiansky, head of the Institute for Strategic Studies and Security Studies, told the Kyiv Independent newspaper.
Russia, on the other hand, has significantly underinvested in the occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions, parts of Ukraine that have been under Moscow’s control since 2014, to extract resources and use them for the war against Ukraine. It is using the area to build military infrastructure.
And Russia is expected to mobilize even more troops. In early January, the Ukrainian military reported a Russian plan to force teenagers as young as 17 in all occupied territories to enroll in Moscow-controlled schools. military enlistment office.
“(Russia) is gathering mobilization resources. Therefore, we expect (municipal) problems to escalate,” Lisiansky said.
Lack of investment
Donetsk resident Oleksandra shared with the Kyiv Independent a video of water flowing down the walls of her apartment from the decaying roof of a five-story building in western Donetsk. It wasn’t the first time.
“After several days of continuous water flow, (repairers) fixed the leak, but this is not a comprehensive repair,” she said.
According to observers, the flow of Russian propaganda into downtown Donetsk is proof that everything is going well in the region, and at the same time Russia and its proxies are not clearing the area for repairs due to the war. They say it is too dangerous to enter the area.
Stanislav Fedorchuk, head of the Ukrainian People’s Council of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, a Kiev-based NGO made up of internally displaced persons from occupied Ukraine, said Russia blames the war for all problems in the occupied territories. He said that it is.
“Look at the regions of Russia that are essentially colonized. There are also big problems with municipal services. This shows what Russia actually brought to the occupied territories: forced mobilization and destruction of infrastructure. ” Fedorchuk told the Kyiv Independent.
Russia does not appear to have any major restoration plans. Russia reportedly allocated just $178 million in its 2024 budget for reconstruction and infrastructure development in the occupied territories. Moscow did not reveal its plans.
At the same time, according to Russia’s 2024 report, Russia will expand its control by six times as much in order to strengthen and develop its control over the occupied territories of Ukraine, including by creating new regional offices, regional investigative committees, and the establishment of the General Prosecutor’s Office. The company plans to spend a total of $1.1 billion. budget.
Meanwhile, in one direction, Russian workers head to the occupied territories, and during the summer, trains carrying coal, metal and grain head towards Russia in the opposite direction.
“200 to 500 vehicles leave every day. (Russian side) has personnel in charge of these logistics,” Lisiansky said.
As civilian infrastructure collapses and local populations die in the war, Russia imports its own citizens to build military facilities in occupied territories.
Lisiansky said Russia is turning occupied Ukrainian regions into large military bases, establishing military units and creating training grounds.
To support these efforts, Moscow is developing a highway from the Russian city of Rostov straight into occupied Crimea, and is linking Mariupol, Bel, an important logistics and military base for the Russian military in southern Ukraine. It passes through Diansk, Melitopol, Geničesk and Žanköy.
Increased resistance
The dire situation is turning even more occupied Ukrainians against Russian forces.
According to Fyodorchuk and Batotsky, a growing number of Ukrainians in the occupied territories are now actively supporting the Ukrainian military by tracking them and sharing location information.
Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (known by its Ukrainian acronym HUR) has observed similar trends.
HUR spokesman Andriy Yusov told the Kyiv Independent that the forced conscription campaign and local issues are “additional incentives” for occupied Ukrainians to help the Wehrmacht.
Yusov said that despite the presence of 35,000 Russian National Guard troops in occupied Ukraine, the regime installed by the Russian government has no control over the Security Service, FSB, or other special forces to control the local population. The agency reportedly requested additional personnel from agencies.
“They will not be able to fully fight our underground resistance movement,” a spokesperson for the National Resistance Center of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said at a press conference in Kiev on January 17. The person’s name was not disclosed for security reasons.
The Center for National Resistance says the addition of Russia’s sylovikiye (Russian term for state-run law enforcement agencies authorized to use force against civilians) will lead to a further wave of Russian pressure and repression against the local population of occupied Ukraine. He said he was deaf.
“Ukrainians understand that the only liberation force is the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” Fedorchuk said.
Also read: The most effective resistance movement in occupied Ukraine
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