Ukrainian football (soccer) teams are refusing to travel for matches after the government kidnapped a player who was traveling for a game and threw him straight into military service. The player in question was only 25 years old. Ukraine’s current laws require men to be 28 for military service. The laws lowering the military age to 26 have yet to go into effect.
Some football clubs have been given military exemptions but not all. The FC Khust club is appealing to the national sports associations and the regional military to “help save Ukrainian football.”
On Wednesday, Ukrainian lawmakers passed a bill that also allows prisoners to be sent into military service. MP Olena Shuliak said that this was only for “prisoners who expressed a desire to defend their country” and that mobilization would be “voluntary and open only to certain categories of prisoners.” Voluntary like this?
