A soldier was shot dead after leaving an army base

Russian authorities announced on Wednesday that they had killed a soldier who had left a military base on January 18, after multiple media outlets reported that he was stationed as part of his unit.Attack in Ukraine.

“Dmitry Perov was searched, found and killed for voluntarily leaving a military unit without permission.The Lipetsk regional government in western Russia said in a statement on Telegram.

He tried to return to his native village

This evidence does not specify where the person was killed or under what circumstances. The local branch of state media VGTRK reported that the 31-year-old soldier had left.Area of ​​special military operations in UkraineAnd he was wanted in the Voronezh and Lipetsk regions.

According to this media, citing anonymous sources, the man was probably armed with a submachine gun, grenades and tried to go to his home village in the Lipetsk region. In recent months, there have been several reported desertions of Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine.

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Wednesday, newspaper Commercial A criminal case was opened against eight soldiers accused of leaving a base in the Ukrainian Luhansk region with their weapons and traveling by taxi to Russia in December. In early December, Russian security forces arrested a fugitive accused of shooting and wounding a policeman and, according to media reports, suspected of being a deserter from the paramilitary group Wagner.

After the offensive in Ukraine began, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed amendments that would have given soldiers who desert the army or refuse to fight up to 10 years in prison. The president faced a major setback on the Ukrainian front Vladimir Putin In September it ordered the mobilization of 300,000 reservists to fight in Ukraine, prompting tens of thousands of Russians to flee the country to avoid being drafted.