"Turnkey service" for $50,000–70,000: Lubinets spoke about a new corruption scheme during mobilization

The Office of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights is verifying information about a new alleged corruption scheme in the mobilization sector, under which a person who has already been taken away by representatives of a territorial recruitment and social support center may be illegally transported outside Ukraine for $50,000–$70,000. This was stated by Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets in an interview with Ukrainska Pravda, reports UNN.

Details

According to him, this concerns a so-called "turnkey" service. The information is currently being verified, so Lubinets did not name the specific region where such a scheme may have operated.

At the same time, he clarified that he was referring to Ukraine's border regions.

One of the latest stories—they tell me, we are currently verifying this information, I will not even name the region now, although everyone understands that we are talking about the border regions—is that there is a new service, the so-called "turnkey" service, when a person can pay between $50,000 and $70,000, and then that person, who has already been taken away in a van, may now be transported directly outside Ukraine

The Ombudsman links the emergence of such schemes to widespread corruption in the mobilization system. According to him, the cost of illegally evading mobilization has only increased over time. He also noted that there are fewer people able to pay large sums, but at the same time, because the risks are increasing, they are willing to pay more.

There are fewer people; there are fewer people who are able to pay, but people understand that the danger, well, is increasing, so they are willing to pay even more for this

According to the Ombudsman, corruption schemes in the mobilization system previously involved considerably smaller, although still substantial, sums. In particular, he said that around $10,000 was charged for the opportunity to "/get out of the van, $15,000 for getting out of the premises of a territorial recruitment and social support center, and $20,000 at the stage of undergoing a military medical commission.

$10,000 for getting out of the van, $15,000 from the premises of the territorial recruitment and social support centers, $20,000 at the stage of the military medical commission—these figures are not going anywhere. Moreover, month after month, this price tag only increases

In his assessment, the conditions for the spread of corruption arose, in particular, because of an approach under which the performance of the mobilization system is assessed primarily by the number of people who need to be mobilized. The Ombudsman explained that, at one point, the relevant structures were tasked with ensuring the mobilization of approximately 30,000 citizens per month throughout Ukraine.

Let's set a target that we need to recruit approximately 30,000 Ukrainian citizens per month throughout Ukraine. Moreover, no one was interested in who these people were. The main thing was to set the target. And they began taking everyone indiscriminately

In Lubinets's view, this system itself contributed to the emergence of corruption mechanisms: people who were physically capable of serving could try to buy their way out, while the numerical targets had to be met at the expense of other citizens.

The Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights also criticized the approach under which the effectiveness of territorial recruitment and social support centers is assessed by the number of people mobilized, rather than by how many people, after mobilization and training, actually reach military units. He  recommended analyzing the effectiveness of each regional territorial recruitment and social support center based precisely on the final result.

In my view, effectiveness should be determined not by the number of people whom you mobilized as if they were checkmarks, but by the number of people whom you mobilized and who reached the front line

He also claims that various stages of the system currently are in fact responsible only for meeting their own formal indicators: territorial recruitment and social support centers are responsible for the number of mobilized people transferred, and training centers for their training, while the final result in the form of the actual replenishment of combat units is not properly analyzed. Lubinets believes that changing this approach could simultaneously improve the quality of military replenishment and reduce corruption risks.

The Ombudsman emphasized that the problem of corruption and violations of citizens' rights during mobilization must be addressed systematically. In his assessment, the lack of an adequate response to illegal actions in previous years became one of the factors behind the growing social tension.

At the same time, Lubinets emphasized that he condemns both the unlawful actions of certain employees of the Territorial Recruitment and Social Support Centers and attacks on servicemen and representatives of the recruitment centers.

I condemn both attacks on employees of the Territorial Recruitment and Social Support Centers and, equally emphatically, criminal offenses committed by employees of the Territorial Recruitment and Social Support Centers. One cannot pretend that some are allowed to act outside the law while others are not

We remind you

In August 2026, the head of the Mykolaiv Regional Territorial Recruitment and Social Support Center was detained for a $15,000 bribe.