Update: On April 2, after the article was published, information that the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, signed a law reducing the age limit for mobilization from 27 to 25 years was published on the website of the Ukrainian Parliament.
On March 29-30, 2024, a video depicting teenagers sitting on a bus was published by a Russian-language Telegram channel, the platform Конт and a Georgian-language Facebook account. According to the caption, the teenagers are being taken to the front in Ukraine.
The mentioned footage is distributed in a manipulative manner, with a false description. The young people sitting on the bus are actually students of the Ivan Bohun military lyceum while mandatory conscription in Ukraine applies to people over 27.
The information was fact-checked by the Italian fact-checking platform – Open.
While checking the video, the organization noticed the coat of arms of the Ivan Bohun Military High School on the uniforms of the students, thus finding out that they were from this military school.
Ivan Bohun Military Lyceum is a secondary educational institution in the military-professional direction located in Kyiv. A photo of the Lyceum coat of arms is displayed on their website.
The photo shows that the logo of this institution is displayed on the uniforms of the students sitting in the bus.
In addition, mandatory mobilization in Ukraine applies to men between the ages of 27 and 60, and minors are not allowed to be sent to the war.
On December 25, 2023, a new legislative project was registered in the Parliament of Ukraine, according to which the age of mobilization should be lowered to 25 years. The said bill was approved on February 7 in the first reading.
About the Source
The Facebook account Dato Faika Nacvlishvili often spreads false claims, which are systematically debunked by Myth Detector.
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