WE'VE VLAD ENOUGH
Conscript protesters arrested & flights fleeing Russia sell out as thousands are called up in Putin’s ‘meatgrinder’ war
MORE than 1,300 protesters have been arrested as anger mounts over Vladimir Putin’s mobilisation of civilians to fight in Ukraine.
Flights out of the country have sold out for eye-watering prices in the wake of the announcement as Russians insist they do not want to be sent into the tyrant’s “meatgrinder”.
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Putin ordered the mobilisation - calling up 300,000 reservists - in a speech on TV in which he also made a thinly veiled threat to nuke the West.
Russia has a reserve of around two million people, most of whom have served in the military in recent years but doubts remain about their fitness and motivation.
Demonstrators took to the streets in 38 cities chanting “no mobilisation” but were met with baton-wielding riot police.
In one video shot inside a restaurant, diners watched in horror as cops shoved a man against the window and battered him.
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In Ulan-Ude, several dozen people came out to protest with posters against mobilisation.
Some carried posters saying "our husbands, fathers and brothers do not want to kill other husbands and fathers".
One St Petersburg protester, Vasily Fedorov, said: “Everyone is scared. I am for peace and I don't want to have to shoot.”
In response to the mobilisation, the Vesna opposition movement said: “Thousands of Russian men - our fathers, brothers and husbands - will be thrown into the meat grinder of the war.
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“What will they be dying for? What will mothers and children be crying for?”
Jailed opposition leader Navalny said in a video message said Putin’s “criminal war is getting worse” so "he wants to smear hundreds of thousands of people in this blood”.
Panic spread among Russians soon flooded social networks, which surged with advice on how to avoid the mobilisation or leave the country and avoid being sent to fight in the Ukraine war.
Google searches for "how to break a hand" soared within moments of Putin's speech.
Within hours, roads at Russia's borders with Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Georgia were jammed as desperate people tried to flee out of fear of being conscripted.
Finnish border guard's head of international affairs Matti Pitkaniitty said 4,824 Russians arrived in Finland via the eastern border on Wednesday.
Video footage emerged of mammoth queues at the Finnish border, but a senior member of Finland's border force said the footage was not real.
Pitkaniitty said: "The situation on Finland's eastern border is normal both on the land border and in border traffic."
One-way flights out of Russia were nearly fully booked this week, airline and travel agent data showed Wednesday, in an apparent exodus of people unwilling to join the conflict.
By the late afternoon, a ticket from a flight from Moscow to Heathrow was listed at a staggering £10,051.
Tickets for the Moscow-Belgrade flights operated by Air Serbia quickly sold out for the next several days.
The price for flights from Moscow to Istanbul or Dubai increased within minutes before jumping again went just over £8,000 for a one-way economy class fare.
Serbia's capital Belgrade has become a popular destination for Russians during the war and they can travel there visa free.
Up to 50,000 Russians have fled to Serbia since Russia invaded Ukraine in February and many have opened businesses, especially in the IT sector.
'DON'T COME BACK'
One Russian man named Sergey said he had prepared for a Russian mobilization scenario and quickly brought his 17-year-old son out of Russia.
As he arrived at the airport in the Armenian capital of Yerevan, he said: “The tickets didn't cost too much, as I was probably quick enough and we got through the border just fine."
His son, Nikolai, added: “I haven’t gotten a letter from the recruitment office yet but he was still researching possible exemptions, so we left.”
According to the independent OVD-Info protest monitoring group, at least 1,386 people have been detained.
It said one woman had been charged with assaulting a police officer in Yekaterinburg, where at least 40 people have been arrested.
The figure also includes at least 509 have been detained in Moscow and 541 in St Petersburg, Russia's second most populous city.
Unsanctioned rallies are illegal under Russia's anti-protest laws.
Independent news outlets said some of those arrested were served summons to report to military enlistment offices on Thursday, the first full day of conscription.
The group said protesters had had their phones confiscated in some areas and were forced into over-crowded police vans.
One army reservist living abroad with a friend has told how he may never return to Russia.
He told the : "According to the new law, adopted the day before the mobilisation announcement, service evaders can go to prison for years. And I don't want to fight. I know what war is.
"In a matter of hours, air tickets to countries where Russian carriers could still fly sold out.
"Dozens of my friends are looking for tickets, housing, packing, moving deep into Russia, away from their place of registration.
"My parents, my girlfriend, my friends, my colleagues and even my boss called me to say not to come back."
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So far Putin's "partial mobilisation" decree has given no clue as to who would be called up.
Defence Secretary Sergei Shoigu said 300,000 people would be mobilised and the contracts of professional troops would be extended indefinitely.
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