Four members of the Russian parliament want to go to war in Ukraine for Vladimir Putin. The quartet announced this after the President’s decision to call up 300,000 reservists. These are the men.
Vladimir Putin sends 300,000 reservists to the Ukraine war. While many Russians fear the deployment, some members of parliament want to fight voluntarily. They are part of Putin’s United Russia coalition. Earlier, the head of the Russian parliament, Vyacheslav Volodin, had called on the State Duma deputies to take part in the war. “Anyone who meets the requirements of partial mobilization should help by participating in the military special operation,” said the Duma chief on his Telegram news channel on Thursday. “There is no protection for MPs.” These are the four men who stand by Putin’s staunch side.
Dmitry Sablin: The British political researcher Samuel Ramani writes about Sablin, deputy chairman of the defense committee: “He was a key player in the protests against the demonstrators on the Maidan in Kyiv. In 2014, Sablin was involved in an attack on Ukrainian border guards in Mariupol. He has several real estate interests in annexed Crimea.”
Vitaly Milonov: Milonov is one of the particularly conservative forces around Vladimir Putin. Milonov recently met in the Donbass with, among others, the businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin, who became known as “Putin’s cook”, and Maxim Shugaley, a high-ranking member of the notorious Wagner mercenary group. The 48-year-old played a key role in the law against “homosexual propaganda”.
Dmitry Khubezov: The 50-year-old is the chairman of the health committee in the Duma. Khubezov is a doctor and was deployed as such in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions after the war began. Among other things, he organized aid deliveries together with Chechen fighters.
Sergey Sokol: The 51-year-old is deputy chairman of the Economic Committee. As Ramani writes, unlike Milonov and Khubezov, for example, he has so far not been involved in activities related to the Russian mission in Donbass. Sokol was born in Sevastopol, a city in Crimea. He represents the Khakassia region in the Duma. Observers say, however, that he has so far taken little responsibility for his region.
United Russia Secretary General Andrey Turchak confirmed that the four men want to join the partial mobilization. He says: “Khubezov, Sablin and Milonov have worked with us in Donbass since the early days of the military special operation.” They “rescued civilians from the hands of the Kiev regime” – a frequent narrative of Russian propaganda.
And Turchak tries another Russian interpretation: “You know very well what it’s like to be a Russian in a Russian country occupied by neo-Nazis [editor’s note]. the editor: This means the Ukraine). What it’s like to fight for the right to be Russian.”
