Russian Conscript Soldier Begs Mom To Help Him Go Home, Intercepted Call Reveals

Some Russian soldiers have asked their parents to help them leave Ukraine, Ukrainian authorities said.

Among them was a conscript who had called his mother as he was looking for ways to go back home, Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) said in a statement.

Conscripts, which make up a fourth of Russia's forces, can leave Ukraine with the help of the prosecutor's office, the trooper claimed.

"You have to work through the prosecutor’s office. I know that they take conscripts back through the prosecutor's office," the soldier told his mother in a supposed intercepted conversation that the SBU released.

Other conscripts wanted to call their parents as well, so they could leave Ukraine, he added.

"They even come to me shaking, 'Let me call dad. He... will deal with it, they will send me back,'" the soldier said, quoting one of his fellow conscripts.

However, the Russian soldier's mother remarked that "our local prosecutor's office is just rotten, damn it."

Her son agreed and said conscripts, like him, were brought to Ukraine for a "show."

"[T]hey left some of them. One of them was 'thrown into battle,' he was at the frontline two times, in tough situations... So he was shaking after that, but they left him here anyway," the soldier told his mother.

The parents of Russian soldiers do not understand why their children were fighting in Ukraine as their government officially claimed on several occasions that "there are none of them there," according to the SBU.

All Russian men between 18 and 27 must serve one year in the military. While dodging the draft is punishable by heavy fines and sentences of up to two years in prison, some have reportedly avoided enlistment by paying bribes or even attending doctoral studies.

Around 134,500 conscripts were expected to enlist into the Russian military following the start of the spring draft.

Russian President Vladimir Putin previously claimed that his country would not use conscripts in the invasion of Ukraine. But Russia's Ministry of Defense later revealed that young draftees participated in the conflict.

Conscripts sent to Donbas, a region in Ukraine partially controlled by pro-Russian separatists and the main theater of Russia's renewed assault, were untrained, had little supplies and carried inadequate weapons.

Russia has lost around 20,900 personnel between the start of its invasion on Feb. 24 and Wednesday, Ukraine's Ministry of Defense claimed in its latest Russian casualties report.