https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/08/ukraine-russia-war-draft-dodgers/Pretty harrowing account of Ukraine struggling to find more men to throw into the meatgrinder.
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A Lviv freight company employee helped more than 50 men flee Ukraine by registering them as truckers. The employee with Smart Way Logistics — who wasn’t identified in court papers filed in June with the Zhokviv District Court — slipped the first one over the border in April 2022. By November 2022, his busiest month, he had helped 13 bogus truckers into Poland. He faced as many as 12 years in prison for each instance but, because he showed remorse and assisted in closing the case, received a seven-year suspended sentence and probation instead.
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“Even if you’re missing a leg, they’ll say you can still fly drones,” he said. He, too, complained about corruption, saying that ordinary Ukrainians are fighting and dying while “members of parliament” and other elites cruise around in Mercedes and other fancy cars.
Guides can be found on social media sites such as Telegram, where the fee starts at $1,200 and up. Besides knowing the terrain, some guides use night-vision goggles and spend time observing Border Guard patrols to learn their habits and vulnerabilities, said Lesia Fedorova, a Border Guard spokeswoman in the detachment near the Romanian border.
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