Russians try to escape conscription as Putin launches fresh attacks on Ukraine

Russia escalated its military and political campaign Thursday to capture Ukrainian territory, rounding up Russian army reservists to fight, preparing votes on annexing occupied areas and launching new deadly attacks.

A day after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a partial mobilization to bolster his troops in Ukraine, dramatic scenes of tearful families bidding farewell to men departing from military mobilization centres in Russia appeared on social media.

Video on Twitter from the eastern Siberian city of Neryungri showed men emerging from a stadium. Before boarding buses, the men hugged family members waiting outside, many crying and some covering their mouths with their hands in grief. A man held a child up to the window of one bus for a last look.

Though polls have suggested widespread domestic support for Russia's intervention in Ukraine, mass conscription may be a domestically risky move after past Kremlin promises it would not happen and a string of battlefield failures in Ukraine.

"Every normal person is [concerned]," said one Russian man identifying himself only as Sergei, disembarking in Belgrade after a flight from Moscow on Thursday. "War is horrible. It's OK to be afraid of war and of death and such things."

One Russian man arriving at Istanbul Airport in Thursday said he had left partly over the Kremlin's decision. "Partial mobilization is one of the reasons why I am here. [It's a] very poor step and it seems to be that it can lead to lots of problems [for] lots of Russian citizens," said Alex, who declined to give a surname.

Another Russian, who gave his name only as Vasily, arrived in Istanbul with his wife, teenage daughter and six suitcases.

"The mobilization was inevitable because there was a shortage of human resources. I am not worried, because I'm already 59 years old and my son lives abroad," he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in some of his harshest comments so far in the nearly seven-month war, lashed out at Russians succumbing to the pressure to serve in their country's armed forces and those who haven't spoken out against the war. In his nightly video address, he switched from his usual Ukrainian language into Russian to directly tell Russian citizens they are being "thrown to their deaths."

"You are already accomplices in all these crimes, murders and torture of Ukrainians," Zelenskyy said, wearing a black T-shirt that said in English: "We Stand with Ukraine," instead of his signature olive drab T-shirt. He said Russians' options to survive are to "protest, fight back, run away or surrender to Ukrainian captivity."

Western leaders have derided Putin's order as an act of weakness and desperation.

Anti-war protests in 38 Russian cities saw more than 1,300 people arrested on Wednesday, a monitoring group said. Some of the detainees had been ordered to report to enlistment offices on Thursday, the first full day of conscription, independent news outlets said. More rallies are planned for the weekend.

Russia said reports of an exodus were exaggerated.

Russian news agencies, meanwhile, reported on Thursday that 10,000 people had volunteered to fight even before their call-up papers had arrived, citing the Russian General Staff.