160,000 people planned to be drafted into Ukrainian forces, National Security and Defense Council head says

A further 160,000 people are to be drafted into the Ukrainian armed forces, which will raise the manning of units to 85%, National Security and Defense Council Secretary Oleksandr Lytvynenko said on Oct. 29 during a session of the Ukrainian parliament.

Ukraine's parliament adopted an updated mobilization law in mid-April to ramp up mobilization amid Russia's ongoing war. The new law simplifies the process for identifying eligible conscripts and includes additional penalties for those dodging the draft.

According to Lytvynenko, 1,000,050 citizens have been drafted into the military so far since the beginning of martial law.

Ukraine has been struggling to mobilize enough soldiers for the front line to compensate for troop casualties and the need to rotate soldiers who have been fighting since the onset of the full-scale war.

After the new law on mobilization came into force in Ukraine on May 18, military-aged men were given 60 days to update their personal data so that the state could locate them.

From May 18 to July 16, 4,690,496 military-aged men updated their data by the July 17 deadline, according to the Defense Ministry.

Nearly one million people were eligible for exemption in mid-August, according to the Defense Ministry.

Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said in early April that he ordered relevant ministries to introduce "updated, more fair" rules on exempting employees of "critically important" companies from military service.

Employees in "strategically important sectors of the economy" will be able to extend their exemption from military conscription, Ukraine's Cabinet of Ministers announced on Oct. 26.