An international anti-war group has received more than one million contacts through texts, calls or website hits from Russians looking to either surrender or avoid military service, Euromaiden Press reports, via former Ambassador Mike McFaul, so you know it’s a legit source and not Bulgarian porn like it sounds. (It’s actually an ABC News report, but McFaul cited the Euromaiden Press report.)
Run by the “I Want to Live” Project, volunteers take calls, emails and texts from soldiers looking to surrender. Many want to give up to the drones they see flying overhead and want instructions. They also want to get in contact using private chat message platforms, with the encrypted Telegram a popular choice.
To date, the project reports it’s facilitated 4,000 surrenders. “We saw that there are many Russians who do not want to fight,” said Vitaliy Matvienko, the project’s spokesperson. “Their numbers skyrocketed after Putin announced mobilization in Russia, while Ukrainian Armed Forces liberated vast territories in the Kharkiv region in a fulminant counteroffensive.”