The National Unity Government (NUG) has today, July 21, officially announced channels of communication for newly conscripted soldiers forced into military service to seek refuge with the people. The terrorist military council is forcibly recruiting youth, aiming to obtain at least 4,000 recruits per batch. According to recent information, nearly 70,000 young people have been forcibly arrested, sent to military training, and deployed to battlefields.
The military council is using their military service law to arbitrarily arrest young people, calling up additional eligible family members even when there are already serving members in the family, threatening to take action against family members for draft evasion, and recalling those who have already completed service under the pretext of emergency situations. Additionally, they have restricted foreign travel and severely limited domestic travel, openly arresting young people on main roads. The council is also developing a National Service Information Management System (NSIMS) to systematically track and trap young people for conscription.
According to testimonies from defectors who have joined the people’s side, the military council is using conscripted soldiers as frontline cannon fodder in conflict areas and forcing them to take drugs before sending them into battle. The NUG has therefore urged newly conscripted soldiers to take opportunities to defect to the People’s Defense Force (PDF) and Ethnic Revolutionary Organizations whenever possible. The military leaders are demonstrably willing to sacrifice people’s lives through any means necessary to maintain their power and personal interests.
The NUG has announced that new soldiers wishing to seek refuge can contact them through various communication channels including Telegram, Signal, Viber, and Messenger. All those who seek refuge will be warmly welcomed by the National Unity Government and allied ethnic revolutionary organizations. The announcement emphasizes that military leaders are clearly willing to use any means necessary to sacrifice people’s lives for their personal benefit and power preservation. The NUG strongly encourages conscripted soldiers to monitor the situation and contact resistance forces to return to the people’s side at the earliest opportunity.
