MOSCOW, April 2. /TASS/. Only around 8% of Ukrainians are ready to join the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and to go and fight on the front lines, Director of the Kiev International Institute of Sociology Vladimir Paniotto said in an interview with the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper.

"According to our estimates, about 8% are ready to take up arms with respect to all categories. Some of them may say they are ready, but it may not actually happen. We did not check this thoroughly," he said in response to a question about how many Ukrainians are willing to go and fight on the front lines.

At the same time, Paniotto claims that "a lot of people" in Ukraine are willing to donate money to support the army or become volunteers, but he did not specify the exact numbers as determined by sociologists.

Since February 2022, a general mobilization has been declared in Ukraine and has been extended several times. It has already led to numerous scandals and exacerbated conflicts within society. While military enlistment office employees conduct raids and use forceful measures against citizens, MPs and officials evade mobilization and send their sons of conscription age abroad. Nevertheless, Ukrainian authorities set the goal of intensifying mobilization from the end of last year. In December 2023, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky revealed that the military command had requested that another 500,000 people be called up for the country's armed forces. At the end of March, the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, stated that this figure had subsequently been significantly reduced.

On February 7, the Verkhovna Rada adopted a bill on tightening mobilization at its first reading. The document envisages introducing electronic summons, canceling deferment for certain categories of men of conscription age, and the possibility of restricting the rights of draft dodgers, up to banning the right to drive vehicles and blocking bank accounts. Some of the strict provisions have sparked sharp criticism in society. On March 12, the Committee on National Security, Defense, and Intelligence began considering amendments. According to Ukrainian media reports, it was decided to abandon some of the document’s provisions.