Russia-Ukraine war: Sons of Putin allies fail to answer the call-up

The sons of some of Russia’s most powerful people have been put on the spot and challenged over whether they would sign up to fight in Ukraine.

Journalists from Russia’s Vazhnye Istorii news outlet last week rang a dozen sons and sons-in-law of political heavyweights, prompting many to hang up when asked if they would answer Vladimir Putin’s call-up.

More than 300,000 Russian men - mainly from poorer rural regions - have been drafted into the army to bolster the Kremlin’s war effort in Ukraine since Putin announced the start of mobilisation in September.

But since then, many of the privileged sons of the country’s elite have continued to live lives of luxury, flaunting holidays and boasting of their peak physical condition even as complaints persist that men too old or unfit to fight have been sent off to the front lines.

Alexei Stolyarov, a 32-year-old fitness blogger whose father-in-law is Sergei Shoigu, Russia’s defence minister, was on holiday in Nepal when he picked up the phone with the reporters. He refused to comment when asked whether he would go to Ukraine to fight.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu attends a meeting with high level military officials in Moscow. Photo / AP

Ilya Medvedev, 27, whose father Dmitry is a former president and the deputy chairman of Russia’s security council, said he had not received a summons to join up. Alexander Kolokoltsev, the 39-year-old son of Russia’s interior minister, rejected suggestions of volunteering but claimed he would be willing to go to Ukraine if he were called up.

“As a Russian patriot and citizen I will always stand to defend it,” he said. “I will act responsibly and go if I’m called up and mobilised.”

Zaur Tsalikov, 31, one of two sons of a deputy defence minister, rebuffed suggestions that he should be deployed to Ukraine.

”Why didn’t I volunteer to go?” he asked. “What do I have to do with the armed forces? There are military men, and people with military professions. I don’t have one.”

The sons of several other leading Russian officials declined to speak to the reporters outright.

Putin, a divorced father of two daughters whose identity he has been hiding, has sought to portray the war in Ukraine as an existential battle between Russia and the West to defend traditional family values.

Since the invasion began on February 24, the family members of several prominent Russian officials have spoken out against the invasion or made vague statements condemning the violence, to the embarrassment of their Putin-supporting parents. Liza Peskova, the daughter of Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, posted an anti-war slogan on social media the day after the invasion began but deleted it later that day.

Peskov’s son Nikolay later appeared to be the victim of a prank call, with callers posing as a recruitment official ordered to report to a military commissariat the next morning, in an apparent attempt to test the belief that the children of influential Russians would be able to dodge the draft.