The spokesman for the “I want to live” program, Vitaly Matvienko, told the Kyiv Post in an interview published on Wednesday that Russian soldiers can contact them to arrange their surrender. “They are saving their lives and fewer will be at the front,” he said. Matvienko explained that the project has a chatbot that Russian military personnel — who have been mobilized or may be mobilized — use to fill out a questionnaire where they can say they don’t want to fight against Ukraine. The project’s hotline then provides those Russians with information to prepare them for the surrender process if and when they are in Ukraine. “When they are sent to Ukraine, they contact our specialists again and we determine their location, and then we plan a plan for a safe exit from that territory,” Matvienko told the Post. “Special operations forces arrange safe exit and the individual eventually arrives in Ukrainian-controlled territory.” Since the initiative was launched on September 18, more than 3,500 appeals have been received through the Telegram channel and hotline, Matvienko said. He did not say exactly how many had successfully participated in a surrender. Military volunteers and civilians receive shooting training at a range in Russia’s Rostov region on November 11. A Ukrainian intelligence program is working to identify and round up Russian soldiers who want to surrender in order to avoid participating in the ongoing war in Ukraine. Stringer/AFP via Getty Images The war in Ukraine has weighed on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s troops, highlighting reports of desertions and morale issues in the Russian military. Ukraine’s defense ministry said in its latest assessment on Wednesday that nearly 83,000 Russian personnel had been killed since the start of the war on February 24. US General Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, gave a separate estimate last week, saying that the total number of dead and wounded in Russia exceeded 100,000. Russia has also faced large-scale public pushback over its partial mobilization order in September that Putin said would call up up to 300,000 additional troops to fight in Ukraine. The draft sparked mass protests and an anti-mobilization petition that gathered hundreds of thousands of signatures within a day of its announcement. Matvienko told the Post that the “I Want to Live” project saw a surge in requests after Putin ordered a partial mobilization, forcing many Russians to face the possibility of being sent to Ukraine. As for the Russians who eventually surrender, some express concerns about how they will be treated at the hands of the Ukrainians, but they are provided with “comfortable conditions”, three meals a day and medical care when needed, Matvienko said. They are also allowed to contact legal representatives and relatives back in Russia, he added. Newsweek has reached out to the Russian Defense Ministry for comment.
